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Article

11 Aug 2020

Author:
Kari Paul, The Guardian

USA: Court issues preliminary injunction to block Uber and Lyft from classifying drivers as independent contractors rather than employees

"Uber and Lyft must classify drivers as employees, judge rules, in blow to gig economy", 10 August 2020.

A California judge has issued a preliminary injunction that would block Uber and Lyft from classifying their drivers as independent contractors rather than employees. The move on Monday came in response to a May lawsuit filed by the state of California against the companies, which alleged they are misclassifying their drivers under the state’s new labor law.

That law, known as AB5, took effect on 1 January. The strictest of its kind in the US, it makes it more difficult for companies to classify workers as independent contractors instead of employees who are entitled to minimum wage and benefits...Judge Ethan Schulman of the San Francisco superior court delayed enforcing his order by 10 days to give the companies a chance to appeal...“When over 3 million Californians are without a job, our elected leaders should be focused on creating work, not trying to shut down an entire industry during an economic depression,” the Uber spokesman said...“This is huge,” said Veena Dubal, an associate professor of law at the University of California...“This is the closest in eight years the judiciary has come to enforcing labor rights in the gig economy.”...

Drivers have also called on these companies to drop their expensive efforts to evade AB5 enforcement and reinvest the funds into helping its workers, said Edan Alva, a Lyft driver and member of advocacy group Gig Workers Rising. “For years, workers have been organizing and speaking out against our mistreatment by billion-dollar gig companies who have refused to obey the law,” he said. “Today, the court sided with workers and not corporations.”

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