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The Almighty Buck Transportation Businesses United States

Half of US Uber Drivers Make Less Than $10 An Hour After Vehicle Expenses, Study Says (recode.net) 156

Posted by BeauHD from the nickeled-and-dimed dept.
Echoing a similar study by the JPMorgan Chase Institute, a new study finds the median hourly pay with tip for Uber drivers in the U.S. is $14.73, which includes tips and excludes expenses like insurance, gas and car depreciation incurred while working. The study was conducted by Ridester, a publication that focuses on the ride-hail industry. Recode reports: Using Ridester's low-end estimate of $5 per hour in vehicle costs, drivers would bring in $9.73 per hour and potentially much less. That implies a driver working 40 hours per week would make an annual salary of almost $31,000 before vehicle expenses, and about $20,000 after expenses (but still before taxes). That's below the poverty threshold for a family of three. It's also a far cry from the $70,000 to $90,000 Uber once claimed its drivers made in major markets.

The study, which was conducted this summer, asked drivers for a screenshot of their Uber app's earnings page from their last full day driving. The 719 valid screenshots they used show how many hours the drivers worked and how much they were paid after Uber's cut. It doesn't factor in other costs like taxes or healthcare. And -- worth noting -- the study only represents drivers who were motivated enough to send in their data and isn't necessarily representative of the geographical distribution of Uber drivers.
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Half of US Uber Drivers Make Less Than $10 An Hour After Vehicle Expenses, Study Says More

Half of US Uber Drivers Make Less Than $10 An Hour After Vehicle Expenses, Study Says

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  • They should go to Amazon. They are paying $15 now.

    • but Amazon's very physically demanding. A lot of Uber drivers are folks who can't stand up straight let alone for 8 hours a day. Still, Amazon being forced to pay $15 will help drive wages up. When it comes to wages a rising tide lifts all boats.

      • Re:A lot will (Score:5, Interesting)

        by torkus ( 1133985 ) on Tuesday October 02, 2018 @10:28PM (#57415214)

        Amazon wasn't forced to pay $15/hr. They decided to freely do so ... which i'll admit comes ahead of an eventual bill that would have cost them significantly more.

        Still, they do set a new standard which will drag up a lot of other companies around them. I still wonder what happened to uber. Their rates have gone up, not down, yet drivers seem to be making substantially less than just a few years ago. Too many cars idling and not getting rides? Uber increased their cut? Something else?

        • I still wonder what happened to uber. Their rates have gone up, not down, yet drivers seem to be making substantially less than just a few years ago.

          They figured out how to squeeze more out of their drivers while paying them less. This is Uber we're talking about here, not Facebook or Google. If they could drive their empl^H^H^H^Hindependent contractors pay down to zero while they took the remaining 100%, they would.

          • I still wonder what happened to uber. Their rates have gone up, not down, yet drivers seem to be making substantially less than just a few years ago.

            They figured out how to squeeze more out of their drivers while paying them less.

            This answer begs the question. How did they squeeze more out of the drivers while paying them less?

            • "This answer begs the question. How did they squeeze more out of the drivers while paying them less?"

              No better job to go to?

            • Sorry, bad phrasing, I meant they effectively squeezed more money out of their drivers by paying them less, so Uber got a larger cut of the revenue.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mjwx ( 966435 )

          Amazon wasn't forced to pay $15/hr. They decided to freely do so ... which i'll admit comes ahead of an eventual bill that would have cost them significantly more.

          Still, they do set a new standard which will drag up a lot of other companies around them. I still wonder what happened to uber. Their rates have gone up, not down, yet drivers seem to be making substantially less than just a few years ago. Too many cars idling and not getting rides? Uber increased their cut? Something else?

          Uber is already dead, it's just that they don't know it.

          No-one involved in Uber is making any money, not the drivers, not Uber, not anyone. It seems the business model of "illegally undercut taxis" isn't a sustainable one because we're quickly finding out that the costs of taxi fares barely covers the costs of running a taxi.

          • Technically, I’m not making money off them, but I am getting my rides to the airport subsidized by a bunch of VC’s as long as they keep operating, so... it’s not all downsides.

        • Uber's rates have actually gone down, but they are taking a higher percentage of the overall charge to the customer and giving less to the driver. The per-trip fees have increased even though the per mile fee has decreased. The driver gets the per-mile fee.

    • Amazon cut their workers pay.

      Amazon workers used to make more than $15 when total compensation is taken into account. Amazon has switched to a flat $15 which is a cut in pay.

    • And after factoring in the car needed to get them to the job site every morning and back at night, how much of that do you think is left?

  • Had my eyes dilated (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Tuesday October 02, 2018 @10:17PM (#57415160)
    and took an Lyft. 14 mile round trip during 'surge' pricing (it was raining) was $26 bucks. I left a $10 tip each way (hopefully Lyft doesn't take 30% of it). One guy was pretty obviously a recently out of work fellow driving an SUV bought during better times...

    Also, $20k is below the poverty threshold for a family of one. Screw the gov't for not raising it. I don't think it's been raised significantly since I was a wee lad.

    • $20k is below the poverty threshold for a family of one.

      Not every job should be required to pay enough to let you afford your own place. Find a roommate while you work on your skillset.

      Most Uber drivers have another job that is their main income. 80% are part time drivers. 20% drive less than 10 hours per week.

      • Re:Had my eyes dilated (Score:5, Insightful)

        by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Tuesday October 02, 2018 @11:28PM (#57415424)
        It really does depend where you live. There are some places in the country where $40k will buy you a decent sized house and others where it will barely let you rent a glorified broom closet for a year.

        To anyone who wants everyone to earn a living wage, find something that you can pay them to do that will afford them that living. The sad truth is that there are some people who lack the skills, aptitude, or desire to be able to earn a living. It's not a mater of personal failing either, unless you think people choose to be born mentally retarded or otherwise disabled that prohibits work. I suspect that most people are more than willing to help the truly incapable, but there are lot of people who are in that situation entirely by choice, either a refusal to work jobs they're capable of (but somehow they think are beneath them) or through a history a poor decisions that have left them with nothing.

        • The sad truth is that there are some people who lack the skills, aptitude, or desire to be able to earn a living.

          Ask anyone that employs entry-level service people (cashiers, short order cooks, dish washers, stocking, etc..) and you will find its neither skill nor aptitude that is lacking, and obviously desire is meaningless here. The people in the endless entry-level cycle are skilled enough to do the job, and of course want a better job and better pay, but they lack responsibility. The primary qualification for service industry jobs is showing up to work when you are scheduled to show up and these people habitually

          • Name ONE service industry job that pays that much and doesn't require a HSD. I was homeschooled, and naively entered the workforce thinking I wouldn't need one (or a GED) because I had experience. I eventually had to lie about having a HSD to get any sort of job that paid a cent above minimum wage, experience be damned.
          • Wow, way to punch down. Comfort the comfortable, afflict the afflicted. Speak truth to the powerless!
          • Not sure I agree with this. I once had a roommate who employed people to sell flowers. Yes, the guys you see standing at traffic lights. His only requirement for the job was that they could properly make change. (i.e if somebody gives them $20 for $8 worth of flowers, they could manage to correctly give make $12). That vast majority of the people who he interviewed couldn't do it.

      • Re:Had my eyes dilated (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Uberbah ( 647458 ) on Tuesday October 02, 2018 @11:33PM (#57415442)

        Not every job should be required to pay enough to let you afford your own place.

        If a business doesn't pay a living wage, that business doesn't deserve to exist.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AvitarX ( 172628 )

          I don't think these two sentiments are at odds.

          It's perfectly fair to say that sharing a house is a livable condition.

          It'd be a struggle to do that (or even impossible) on 20k year where I live (and cover any unexpected costs and save for retirement), but I'd say living in an unshared life is a luxury pretty far up the list.

        • If a business doesn't pay a living wage, that business doesn't deserve to exist.

          Your ideals are naive. Good luck on making Wal-Mart not exist. :)

      • "Not every job should be required to pay enough to let you afford your own place."

        It's a race to the bottom - and we're gonna WIN!

      • Not every job should be required to pay enough to let you afford your own place.
        Actually it should. Especially if it is a 50h - 60h per week job.

        Find a roommate while you work on your skillset.
        In a single room, haha ... or sleeping in a SUV with a room mate?

        Most Uber drivers have another job that is their main income. 80% are part time drivers. 20% drive less than 10 hours per week.
        Why do you claim that? How many Uber drivers do you know in person?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by mpercy ( 1085347 )

      "Also, $20k is below the poverty threshold for a family of one."

      Really?

      2018 Poverty Guidelines for the 48 Contiguous States and the District of Columbia [federalregister.gov]
      Persons in family/household Poverty guideline
      1 $12,140
      2 16,460
      3 20,780
      4 25,100

    • Then they don't have to work the fucking job.

      Seriously.

      If someone said "I'll pay you $7/hour to dig a ditch" I'd simply say no thanks and get a job at McDonalds (or, as of recently Amazon) who easily pays $15+ or more.

      Why do people think people are ENTITLED to do what they want and just demand they get paid a living wage in complete disregard for the economics of the work?

  • to run my shop I would be making twice as much. No forced them to be an Uberneer.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      Yeah no one, just starvation, living naked in the streets and being used as target practice by the local county mounties and if you survive it is off to the for profit prison and slave labour. Yep, absolutely no one forcing them at all :/.

      • You speak as if people haven't been forced to make a living since the Dawn of Man. Where's this paradise you speak of where people don't have to work? I'd like to move there and smoke pot and play video games all day and let someone else pay for me.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by Uberbah ( 647458 )

          You speak as if people haven't been forced to make a living since the Dawn of Man

          Congratulations on getting the point. Working is a necessity, not a choice. And if the work available is driving for Uber for less than minimum wage after gas and maintenance, people will do it for a roof or food.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by novakyu ( 636495 )

        Serves you right for being a Canadian.

        • Reminds me at the cartoon I lately saw somewhere on the web.
          Imagine 50er style 4 colour print.

          Mom is cooking and her son asks:
          "Mom, what is a Canadian?"

          "Oh, Dear, that is a north american with no guns and health insurance"

          "Doh!"

  • Uber never promises you will make any sort of minimum amount. They tout "make up to...", but ever "make at least". On one hand, I can feel bad. Think is, only way it really changes is if the drivers band together and won't drive unless they get paid more. Oh wait, that's what Uber is against........

  • Nothing showed me the "bad at math" tax more than talking to a driver who was renting their car via Lyft... at $250/week with insurance. They looked at it as they just need to drive 12 hours per week and the car is free. I understand extenuating circumstances, but talk about indentured servitude...

    I really appreciate the fact that it is half the price of a taxi-- it means I don't have to rent a car and drive myself nearly as often, so potentially it is better in economic terms. At 20% more though, I don'

    • They looked at it as they just need to drive 12 hours per week and the car is free. I understand extenuating circumstances, but talk about indentured servitude...

      If they drive enough hours (I believe 40 hours of what Lyft determined to be "peak time"), it actually is free (paid by Lyft) that week. It rapidly approaches a regular job at that point, since if you supply enough peak rides, the car costs (car, insurance, maintenance) is covered. Not gas though...

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by asylumx ( 881307 )
      Just to pile on, here's an article from Mr. Money Mustache [mrmoneymustache.com] about his Uber experiment and how the math worked out. Obviously he did this as an experiment and there may be some other tricks & benefits if you're "full time", but even so, the results are not encouraging for drivers. Ultimately his costs for his day (2 hours) of driving worked out to about $7/hr after expenses -- and that was in an electric car, not accounting for electric costs because he uses free charging stations wherever possible.
    • Why is $250/week bad? Many taxi drivers need to rent their taxis. Per day. Where I am it costs about $160 per DAY for a driver to rent a taxi and the driver needs to pay for gas.
  • As an Uber driver let me just add that you can to catch mad amounts of pokemon in Pokemon Go while waiting for a ride so there's that.

  • According to Google the average cost per year for a car is $8000-$9000 which brings a $15 and hour salary down to about $11.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • You can't make money out of nothing, or rather wealth out of nothing

      Of course you can.... look at Rembrant arranging paint, or the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Or the invention of the airplane.

      Bill Gates, for example, if he'd had to compete fairly in a level-playing-fielded marketplace, in which he couldn't exploit the system and guess right, (guess, not KNOW,) in what ways he could do things, would be a name you and I would most likely NEVER have heard of.

      It may not have been BG who won, but someone would

    • Well, gee, we should just let Hallux run our economy and then only perfectly just economic decisions would get made. You are entirely capable of determining what is fair for everyone to get paid for what they know and are capable of, right?
      And if someone wants to pay someone more than you'll allow... well I guess you could have either the willing buyer of services or the willing seller of services imprisoned for trying to perform an unjust transaction!
      In a free society, however, prices aren't set by a thir

  • No skill required besides driving that everyone does anyway, no job interviews, no fixed hours. Car depreciation only needs to be paid off years later, which is a good tradeoff if you need cash now. So the main complaint is that an entry level job is... an entry level job. If you learn to drive a bus or a luxury limo, or do something that requires more skill than just driving around, you can get more.

    • Flexibility is a big bonus. Talked with one driver whose regular job was OTR trucker, he kept ending up with short stretches at home between his usual assignments and started driving for Uber because it got him out of the house and brought in a little money. No way that guy would have bothered with working a traditional taxi job where you have to pay the company to get one of their cars for the whole day.

  • Is this ridesharing, where the title suggest that you're just sharing your vehicle on the way to a prescheduled event. Or are these people professional taxi drivers?

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