Comment by dsfyu404ed | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dsfyu404ed | Hacker News Reader

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>The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done.

>I read this as: truckers will no longer be expect to supply their own $150,000 trucks to get into the business.

Loads formerly carried by owner/operators and small fleets will in steal be hauled by Swift, Schneider and the like. Those are the kinds of companies that have enough people to absorb these new laws with little cost other than shuffling drivers and trucks around to comply.

Owner/operator and small fleet is where truckers go after they've put in their time working for the bottom of the barrel driving sweatshops (the big dry van companies). Removing those small operators is basically removing the part of the industry that sucks the least to work in.

This is basically the trucking equivalent of replacing the independent sandwich shops with Subway and saying it's no big deal because meals are still getting served. Sure it may be an improvement for some people but the rigidity that comes with working for a big company (yes I know it's a franchise but the franchise tightly controls each location so bear with me here) be bad lot of the people formerly working for the small shops.

>I read this as: truckers will no longer be expected to "comply with the laws, wink wink" to meet impossible schedules in ways that legally aren't the contracting company's fault.

This doesn't remove the federal electronic logs mandate and DOT working hours rules.

Edit: improved restaurant analogy.

Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees.

Now if you had a restaurant that tried to claim their staff were all independent contractors (because they worked for multiple restaurants in the same chain) in order to avoid complying with labor law, you'd have a closer analogy. Ultimately this sounds like they wanted to get away with offloading the risks of trucking to the individual rather than deal with it at a business level.

> Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees.

The analogy is not 100% equivalent, as truckers in question are independent owners and operators.

Closer restaurant analogy would be someone opening a taco truck, and getting hired to cater a small event. California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations, so pay up or hire caterers from a well-established corporate entity like Wendy's. For analogy's sake let's also consider that the taco truck owner has already invested a six-digit amount into their [now useless] food truck.

This benefits large established corporations in favor of small independent businesses.

It helps no one, as truckers always had a choice to go work for one of those large corporate entities (the churn in corporate trucking is consistently high, which is why you tend to see those "We're hiring" signs on the back of the trucks) if they wanted a full array of benefits and schedule/routes set by someone in corporate. For whatever personal reasons (larger take-home income, benefits provided by spouse, ability to choose preferred routes, schedule preferences, etc.) they chose not to.

For what it's worth, labor law specifically carves out restaurant owners and their family members (including things like minimum wage). Truckers want the same carveout.

> California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations

The law says no such thing. The biggest change from pre-existing law regards the second prong of the new law, which asks whether the type of work is within the usual course of the hiring entity's business. This is the same test in pre-existing law, it's just that this test is applied strictly rather than only given weighted consideration.

Are you a company that organizes and dispatches taco trucks? You're likely effected. Are you a company that hires a taco truck every Tuesday for employee lunch? I'd bet money that you're safe. Are you a family hiring a taco truck for a birthday party? It's ludicrous to suggest the new test imposes a legal burden on you.

Now if you had a restaurant that tried to claim their staff were all independent contractors (because they worked for multiple restaurants in the same chain) in order to avoid complying with labor law, you'd have a closer analogy.

That's Travis Kalanick's "Cloud Kitchens".

Hit it right on the head.

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