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NYC Gig Workers Are Organizing Against Rampant E-Bike Theft and Assault (vice.com) 113

Posted by BeauHD from the poor-working-conditions dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: A massive procession of gig workers riding e-bikes with food coolers strapped to their backs protested in streets of Manhattan on Wednesday with a growing set of grievances: wage theft, no access to bathrooms, arbitrary deactivations, rampant e-bike theft, and violent assault and murder while they're working. The mass demonstration was the second organized by Los Deliveristas Unidos, a growing grassroots campaign formed by immigrant Latinx delivery workers in New York City during the pandemic. The group formed last year to organize for better working conditions on food delivery apps, as New Yorkers laid off during the pandemic have turned to gig work. In recent weeks, workers have organized on Whatsapp and other apps to form self-defense groups. Organizers estimate more than 1,000 app-based delivery workers attended Wednesday's protest -- which took over Times Square. Delivery workers honked horns, waved Mexican and Guatemalan flags, and raised banners in Spanish that said "Don't buy bikes on the street without a receipt" and "United we are stronger."

Wednesday's protest follows a growing trend of violent assaults and murders of app-based grocery and food delivery workers not just in New York City, but across the United States. In early April, a 29-year old e-bike delivery delivery worker, Francisco Villalva Vitinio, was shot and killed while delivering food in Manhattan. In Washington DC, two teenage girls allegedly carjacked and killed a 66-year old UberEats driver, Mohammed Anwar, in late March. Gig workers have also been killed in Illinois, Texas, Virginia, New Jersey, and Michigan over the past 18 months. The assaults and murders have forced e-bike delivery workers to do their jobs with the constant threat of violence and financial ruin looming over their heads. "Los Deliveristas Unidos is pushing for New York City Council to pass a package of laws that would improve their working conditions, including the right to use restaurants' bathroom (which have been closed to workers during the pandemic), insurance to protect workers from robberies, free personal protective equipment, access to a copy of their receipts to verify tip amounts, and limits to distance and weight on deliveries," adds Motherboard.
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NYC Gig Workers Are Organizing Against Rampant E-Bike Theft and Assault More

NYC Gig Workers Are Organizing Against Rampant E-Bike Theft and Assault

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    • Most of the reason is that they're easy targets. Thieves, especially petty thieves, don't become thieves because they're smart or hard-working, they become thieves because they're lazy and stupid. (A few out of financial desperation, but a definite minority.) E-bikes don't generally have keys, if they're not locked up you just get on and pedal away, and typical bicycle locks are cumbersome for someone who is going to get off to enter a dozen or more restaurants and make two dozen deliveries. All of the major delivery companies have been caught shorting tips for the delivery staff, too. A lot of them are illegals, they can't really complain without risking deportation.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      In a sense, it is the "tragedy of the commons" all over again, namely some (not very many) ruining the whole for purely short-sighted egotistical reasons. What makes this even more stupid is that in the current pandemic, every delivery person is critical for keeping things going.

    • Why are these people being targeted like this?

      Most crimes are crimes of opportunity. So basically, their profession provides a lot of opportunities for crimes to be committed against them.

    • Re:Why are these people being targeted like this? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by bluescrn ( 2120492 ) on Friday April 23, 2021 @04:35AM (#61303980)
      Bike theft is an epidemc, and it isn't taken seriously, nowhere near as seriously as car theft. If we want to replace cars with bikes (especially expensive ebikes), that's got to change.

  • app companies need to enforce this (Score:3)

    by redback ( 15527 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @06:49PM (#61302472)

    It should be a condition of being on the apps that the restaurants provide bathroom access for delivery providers.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cusco ( 717999 )

      New business plan:

      Port-a-johns distributed around the city, cleaned nightly, $1/use, secured with key card, for delivery and service personnel. Volume discount for large customers like Uber, Fed Ex, and Amazon, or maybe direct contract with the companies.

      • Re:app companies need to enforce this (Score:4, Interesting)

        by vinn01 ( 178295 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @07:27PM (#61302594)

        Port-a-johns in any US city would require wheelchair (ADA) access. That's US law. Instead of being the size of a port-a-john, it has to be the size of a small cottage. And because it's actually a small cottage, homeless people love them. The idea has died in every US city that has tried it.

        European cities has had them for at least 25 years, many are fully self-cleaning,
        Sanisette: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

        • These exist in the US as well. I have not used the ones in Paris. Although the self-cleaning ensures they are never filthy, they are never really clean either. The surfaces are all wet when you enter. And the constant dampness leaves a characteristic odor. I've used them in a pinch. Certainly not the worst thing ever especially for males.

          When I lived in Switzerland, there was a company called McClean (yes really) that ran attended pay toilets in the larger train stations. Those had human cleaners

      • Once upon a time, NYC did a proof of concept of self-cleaning public toilets. One would pay the fee, go in, do one's business, leave, then it would clean itself. If you stayed more than 15 minutes the door would automatically open and lock open until you left. People loved it.

        Do you want to know why you don't see them? The units weren't handicap accessible. Activists pointed to the ADA which gave the handicapped a right to use any public restroom which is why all public restrooms have a handicap accessib

    • From the restaurants' position, these delivery drivers are really no different then take out customers. Take out customers don't get bathroom access anymore either. Nor do the homeless that also buy food from these places.

      This just adds to the need for public bathrooms and showers.

      It would also be nice if there were better ways of securing bicycles. Most places of employment don't exactly have a storage space for bicycles, especially if more then one or two people started to actually use it. This is worse f

      • Wow..where do you live where restaurant bathrooms aren't open to ANY paying customer?

        I"ve never seen that before...

    • You forget the shady approaches that these apps use when it comes to restaurants - in plenty of cases, the restaurant doesn't even know its on the app, the listing isn't theirs, the pricing isn't theres and often theres discrepancies between the menu they offer and the menu the app offers.

      Even if the restaurant is on the app voluntarily, the app typically takes a huge cut - why should the restaurant have to provide employee benefits to the apps employees? They take enough of a cut, let them provide the fac

    • A lot of the time the business is not partnered with these delivery services. If anybody should be forced to grant bathroom access it should be the person who hired them.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      Another condition, the apps have built in live streaming. Mount a gopro et al to your helmet and live stream into the app. Make it known riders live stream and you will be recorded and the amount of thefts will drop. The e-bike, you exactly who they are selling them to, other gig workers, probably ones who have had their bike stolen.

      So going to the USA, DO NOT GET ON A EBIKE, under no circumstance mount or ride an e-bike, it can get you killed. Renting one, bad idea because you will likely end up having to

      • Riding an e-bike a death sentence. Wow you got troubles in the USA and they are getting worse.

        Only in shithole urban cities like NYC and the like it seems.

        Thankfully, those aren't the predominant city model in the US.

        There's reason people are leaving those places like rats abandoning ships.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by fermion ( 181285 )
      Rappi, the delivery service in Colombia, recently put together a set of benefits for it drivers, including bathrooms. Delivery, taxi, and the like, have always been easy targets, and have never had an easy job. Some of this is just people looking to make easy money not understanding that it is not an easy job, and high risk. The Rappi people work incredibly hard, and in great danger as people on two wheels often get killed in the city. In the US it is just going to be a matter of ending the facade that the

  • Great way to gain sympathy (Score:5, Informative)

    by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @07:16PM (#61302558)

    Delivery workers honked horns, waved Mexican and Guatemalan flags, and raised banners in Spanish

    Nothing says let's have better working conditions than using some other country's flag and language rather than the country you are working in.

    For the record, nearly all my family are immigrants. All speak English and some of their former language. They are all U.S. citizens. While they do (or used to) socialize with people who spoke their native language, they never demanded businesses use their native language.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      The United States doesn't have an official language. Most countries do, but not the US. English is merely the most popular, but Spanish is just as valid.

  • Stop using "Latinx" (Score:3, Informative)

    by FuzzMaster ( 596994 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @07:17PM (#61302564)

    This term is used almost exclusively by non-Spanish speakers and doesn't represent Latin Americans.

    https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2020/08/11/about-one-in-four-u-s-hispanics-have-heard-of-latinx-but-just-3-use-it/

    • Re:Stop using "Latinx" (Score:5, Informative)

      by Gravis Zero ( 934156 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @07:59PM (#61302734)

      Stop using "Latinx"
      This term is used almost exclusively by non-Spanish speakers and doesn't represent Latin Americans.

      They aren't exaggerating: About One-in-Four U.S. Hispanics Have Heard of Latinx, but Just 3% Use It [pewresearch.org]

      • That'll teach me not to post a URL without an anchor tag.

      • They aren't exaggerating: About One-in-Four U.S. Hispanics Have Heard of Latinx, but Just 3% Use It [pewresearch.org]

        Quite possibly because they actually understand their own language and that "Latinos" is the correct gender term for a group of people of mixed genders. Only non Spanish people idiots think Latinx is some kind of gender equality success rather than a foreigner having no understanding of the concept that gendered nouns have little to do with people's actual gender.

        • Only non Spanish people idiots think Latinx is some kind of gender equality success

          Well you just permanently offended a bunch of idiots. I hope you're happy.

          • Well you just permanently offended a bunch of idiots. I hope you're happy.

            While I'm still trying to figure out what a people idiot is (don't drink and Slashdot Garbz :) ) if I offended an idiot then I sincerely do, ... indeed feel joy.

    • Thefe is a sort of movement which is attempting to eliminate all use of gendered words. The X is used to signal that you are Woke and Proper.

    • The term "Latinx" is a great example of wokeness run amok.

      It is designed to be inclusive yet ignores the view of the people being "included" who tend to think the term is idiotic.

      Some languages, such as Chinese, don't use gendered grammar or nouns. Others, such as English, have a few gendered nouns and pronouns so it is possible to try to reduce their use. But Romance languages such as Spanish have gender so deeply ingrained in every aspect of the language that there is no possible way to remove them with

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by cusco ( 717999 )

        Was informed early when learning Spanish about gendered nouns. Two women is 'ellas', but twenty five women and one man is 'ellos'. I still have trouble with the irregular nouns, even after 30+ years. El agua, la mano, etc.

      • In this case, "Latinx" is a demonstration that this isn't really a "grassroots" organization but is run by the same activist networks that run so many other organizations. 100% Astroturf. Actual Spanish speakers don't use "Latinx".

  • It's a lie. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Sir Holo ( 531007 ) on Thursday April 22, 2021 @07:38PM (#61302646)

    The "Gig Economy" is one big, fat lie.

    Pay is bad. Benefits are nonexistent. You might get mugged. You have to buy your own equipment. And on and on.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by imidan ( 559239 )
      But, hey, look at all the freedom these workers have. All they have to do, if they don't want to get robbed and/or murdered at work, is to quit!
  • NOBODY in the Latino community uses that word. Only stupid clueless racist idiot white people use the term. In the last college survey I saw, 99% of latinos don't like the term and think it's offensive.

  • A.K.A. How you can tell a young white person wrote the article.

  • Social breakdown manifests in these kind of ways. I'm sure there's going to be a lot of guessing why all that is, but when it comes down to it, none of it fixes the problem. We'll either not have all these nice things, or we'll invent some technological solution that doesn't so much "solve" as skirt around by taking the fallible human out of the equation. e.g. drones, while introducing new problems. e.g. congestion, etc.

  • "wage theft, no access to bathrooms, arbitrary deactivations, rampant e-bike theft, and violent assault and murder while they're working."

    Getting murdered on the job tends to make people cranky, I get it.

  • The best solution to this problem is to defund the NYC police. ...as some mayoral candidates are running on.

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