Let's go next to our color from the three to three area code.
Who's calling today from three to three?
Well, that one was here.
[inaudible].
Let's see.
Going into us,
we've been moving in graphs.
Yes.
Uh, one of the guys I'm calling from Los Angeles, my name is Manuel Antonio Rodriguez.
Um, I want to talk to you about, uh, Uber and Lyft, Uber and Lyft drivers.
Okay.
Um, so yesterday there was a big rally outside of the LA city council.
Uh, they approved the measure to look into possibly paying, uh, Uber and Lyft drivers,
$30 an hour, and the city of LA.
Uh, I guess I kinda just wanted to, uh, hear your from that.
And the idea behind this is that, you know, $15 will go towards your wages and then $15
to the, towards maintaining the car.
Because as you may or may not know, as many listeners may not know, um, we're not, you
know, compensated or we're not, you know, reimbursed for any gas card maintenance and,
um, you know, other things that go along with, you know, maintaining your car and driving
it.
And so I guess I just kinda want to hear your thoughts on that.
And then more tying that into yesterday's debate.
I guess I wanted to hear what your thoughts on, uh, Camela Harris cause she did, you know,
spill out a line out there where she did say, you know, workers shouldn't have to work a
full time job and then driving Uber, you know, after their full time job.
And I guess I wanna know what your thoughts on that as soon as she does have, you know,
some of our political strategists and family are very closely tied with Uber.
You know, I want to hear your thoughts on that.
And I'm also, you know, uh, uh, how do I say it?
A big fan of your show.
So, you know, thank you for taking my call.
Thank you.
Well listen, I don't, I don't remember exactly that moment.
I must, that must've been when I was dealing with copyright claims when Kamala Harris said
that.
So I don't remember seeing that.
But look here, here's the main thing with the Uber and Lyft stuff.
I'll check it out though.
So here's the thing, uh, if you, there are too many people who are not considering the
cost of gas and uh, depreciation of their vehicle when they are thinking about how much
money they are making from Uber and Lyft.
And there is no question that Uber and Lyft drivers are underpaid, uh, unfortunately almost
any effort to pay them more other than chipping away at what Uber and Lyft keep, which they
are going to be very hesitant to give up.
Obviously a for better or worse is going to lead to increased prices for the rides passed
along to the end user.
Now that doesn't mean that that's bad.
I mean Uber and Lyft rides maybe should cost more and that would be okay with me as long
as that money was going to the drivers.
Uh, that being said, I think that there are some systemic problems going on with Uber
and Lyft.
For example, Uber and Lyft benefit greatly from not being the employers of the drivers.
The drivers are independent contractors.
And we've talked about how Amazon uses that same strategy when they contract out to local
delivery companies for their, you know, prime one day in two day deliveries and then it's
a fiasco.
They're underpaid, they get into accidents and Amazon goes, listen, these people don't
work for us.
These are just subcontractors.
So I think that more needs to be done there.
I don't know that much about the proposal for $15 an hour wage plus 15 an hour for maintenance
and gas.
I don't know how the math of it adds up, but the situation as it exists right now is hugely
oppressive to the drivers.
100%
yeah.
I guess I just want to let you know that I worked for Uber full time and I'm actually
pulled over right here in the one of the city and one of the streets of LA and, and you
know when you calculate it over, it doesn't, Uber doesn't tell you I lived I and tell you
how much the driver pays.
But you know, sometimes you'll get in conversations with folks and they'll be like, you know,
I paid $20 for this.
Right.
And then you know, afterwards you see how much Uber pays you.
And sometimes that'll be like $9 $10.
Yeah.
And it always fluctuates.
So sometimes you're like, you're thinking like, wow, were just 50% of you know of this
writing.
Well then in that case I revisit maybe, maybe the place that a lot of the money should be
coming from is Uber and lifts cut.
I mean that, that I, I if that's the case then I think so
I agree with that.
And then one more thing, I just wanted to make, I guess a quick plug for the organization
that I'm, you know, organized yesterday, the van, it was a, the mobile workers Alliance,
whether there's any, you know, drivers, they're listening to yourself and I definitely would
like for them to get involved.
You know, it's, it's, we need to, you know, fight back because it's very unfair.
And then, um, no, last thing I wanted to talk to you about David was yeah, I was watching
your thing on your stream on Twitch yesterday and I guess I did.
Did it something go down or
Oh yeah, we got a copyright.
We got a copyright strike and I was banned for Twitch for 24 hours, but we're not going
to deal with dwell on the negative [inaudible] Antonio, really appreciate your phone call
and a good, good luck out there.
You want to mend it?
All right.
We will hopefully talk to him again.
High color rating.
Very, very high collar rating.