“But Workers Like The Gig Economy!”

I served as the lead expert witness for the Massachusetts Attorney General Office in that suit, and my task was to explain the Uber and Lyft business model to the court—that is, the methods that the companies use to create sustainable profits.

To fulfill this task, I had access to evidence collected through discovery by the Massachusetts Attorney General over several years. For the many academics and governments that have attempted to get an accurate picture of working conditions in the gig economy over the years, this data is something of a holy grail: Most studies of gig worker income, hours, safety, and such are built on laboriously collected surveys. The companies themselves claim these data as proprietary trade secrets and guard closely against release into the public domain.

After reviewing the data, I came to a very clear conclusion: Drivers don’t have flexibility because they want it. They have it because it is the essential core of Uber’s and Lyft’s business model.

This may not seem earthshaking news. But it contradicts a fundamental plank of every one of the regulatory fights that gig companies have faced over the last decade.

— “The Dangerous Myth of Flexibility,” David Weil in The American Prospect