Do people that sell things on Amazon need to be provided benefits from Amazon? How about AirBnB hosts — should that company provide sick days? How is an independent person with a car selling a transportation product any different than someone selling widgets through Amazon? Perhaps the difference is that Uber sets prices?
I would offer that a free market solution to Uber is to allow drivers to set their own rates — that would result in a far more efficient market. Taxis ought to be able to set their own rates as well. It’s better than this price floor/ceiling situation we have now.
> Do people that sell things on Amazon need to be provided benefits from Amazon?
No, they're not working for Amazon. And if they're selling large amounts of things regularly, the local equivalent of IRS will kindly remind them that they should be doing it as a business.
> How about AirBnB hosts — should that company provide sick days?
No. But hosts putting their property on AirBnB regularly should also comply with appropriate regulations, which most likely will involve them registering as a business.
> How is an independent person with a car selling a transportation product any different than someone selling widgets through Amazon?
Same as above. Drop someone off to work in exchange for fuel money? Nobody cares. Start behaving like a transportation service, and the government will want you to register as a transportation service business.
One of the many tricks Uber tried to pull off is Schrödinger's employment - the drivers are to be independent contractors when it comes to liabilities and the taxman, but otherwise the drivers are to be like employees. But, as Uber is discovering, you really can't have it both ways.
Yes you've identified the key difference which is one of the tests used in UK courts to determine if someone is really a contractor or actually a disguised employee and ability to set price matters.
If Uber did let drivers set price then it wouldn't be facing these issues and would just be an arbitrage marketplace. Of course if they did that their prices wouldn't be low and they wouldn't be as popular since currently they subsidise pricing.
I would offer that a free market solution to Uber is to allow drivers to set their own rates — that would result in a far more efficient market. Taxis ought to be able to set their own rates as well. It’s better than this price floor/ceiling situation we have now.