I am Voting No on Prop 22

Prop 22 exempts app-based transportation and delivery service drivers from the requirements of AB 5. In plain English Prop 22 exempts drivers for Lyft, Uber,
Doordash and similar companies from being classified as employees. The EDD website says that a person is an employee unless ALL of the ABC conditions are met. I am not a labor lawyer but to me these drivers do not meet all of the conditions below. So legally they are employees.

A. The person is free from the control and direction of the hiring entity in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of the work and in fact.
B. The person performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business.
C. The person is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed.

Prop 22 is about money and fairness. Under AB 5 drivers would be covered by unemployment insurance and state and local labor laws regarding minimum wages and other protections. This will most likely lead to an increase in the cost of rides and deliveries. Under Prop 22 the companies have promised some additional benefits of a lesser amount (for example, their minimum wage promise only relates to hours AFTER drivers receive calls, not waiting time) and will also lead to cost increases.

There is a long history of companies structuring arrangements to avoid paying employment related taxes and avoid abiding by minimum wage rules. I find that unfair in relation to all the companies that treat employees as employees and support extending labor protections to these drivers.

I do think there are cases where AB 5 should be clarified to exclude long-standing arrangements where the workers do meet the ABC test and may have been mistakenly included in AB 5; but not for these drivers.