Taxi and Uber Workers Unite In Battle For Employment Status

With its unprecedented rise to the global transportation industry, the ride-sharing tech company has slipped through a lot of wet roads, including legal ones. Its new and improved features are likely to draw in more users in the future, but its workers and competitors are left behind with some grudges.

As cited by Times, ever since the dot-com bubble's cultural impact, tech companies have increasingly been tied to venture capital. A quick look at Uber's stocks after rumors of its initial public offering (IPO) is telling of the company's future, with a lot of buzz generated over its recent forays with driverless cars and drone taxis. The deployment of its services in developing countries has increasingly been seen as an intrusion of public space, and yet the results of its small steps in the Latin American market proves different, according to this report by Bloomberg.

In a report by New York Times, two Uber drivers were given employee status after a New York State Department of Labor ruling which identified them as eligible to receive unemployment benefits, after being deactivated from Uber's system. The weekly benefits run up to $425 for each driver. Just recently, the New York Taxi Workers Alliance sued the state on behalf of the two drivers, Jakir Hossain and Levon Alesanian, for its refusal to "investigate or adjudicate complaints for unemployment insurance benefits."

Alesanian and Hossain filed their unemployment case together after their deactivation from the ride-sharing platform. However, due to the volume of applications in Uber's contracts with drivers, their applications weren't read for months. The ruling only applies to the two drivers, but the NYTWA is now leading the struggle to demand a "comprehensive audit" of Uber's labor practices.

At a press confence regarding their class-action lawsuit against Uber, NYTWA Executive Director Bhairavi Desai has said that because Uber "has depended on the political structure turning a blind eye." decisions such as those made by the New York State Department of Labor "force a microscopic review." to an otherwise bigger problem.

What casual work means may change in the future, with technological advances going in the way of traditional infrastructures. Check out this video and see why Uber's stake in the future of transportation is shifting its focus.