Uber drivers are not employees, Regulation of the National Relations Council. Drivers have seen coming: NPR

Just as customers anticipate the arrival of an Uber, observing the tiny image of a car plotted on a map over the phone, Uber drivers claim to have anticipated (and predicted) the decision of the National Labor Relations Commission denying them recognition employees.

The NLRB released the information note on Tuesday, almost a month after its initial release. He concludes that Uber drivers are independent contractors and not employees – a classification that means that they do not have the right to form a union or bargain collectively.

The memo, which comes from the NLRB's Senior Legal Counsel, serves as a recommendation for decisions in future cases, but will not affect many of the pending lawsuits.

The announcement of this decision follows the national day of action organized by Uber and Lyft drivers last week. And, have pointed out some, strangely close to Uber 's initial disappointing public offer on Friday.

Although the decision may be disappointing for motorists 'advocates, several groups of drivers across the country say they are neither discouraged nor discouraged from continuing to enforce policies to regulate drivers' working conditions at motor vehicle levels. State and municipalities.

"The NLRB is not a place where our rights are protected, given the position of the Trump administration," NPR spokeswoman Nicole Moore, spokeswoman for Rideshare Drivers United in Los Angeles, said in a statement. echoing a sentiment shared by other advocates in the region.

"It's not because we can not be a union that we can not act as a union," added Moore.

She pointed out that the NLRB's board was narrow in scope; it prevents drivers for Uber, and by extension for Lyft and other application-based drivers, from joining a union, but it does not address issues related to minimum wage or hourly working limits, she declared. "And that's a good thing."

Driver groups across the country, inspired by the progress made in New York and California, have turned away from further federal change at the state and city levels.

In California, the state legislature is using it to codify a 2018 Supreme Court decision establishing an "ABC test" to determine who is an independent contractor and who is an employee.

In New York, the Taxi and Limousine Commission voted in December to introduce a base rate of $ 17.22 per hour, making it the first city in the country to set a minimum wage rate. for drivers using an application. The city has also imposed a moratorium on new vehicle registration permits.

Chicago lawyers use New York as a model.

"We are looking at what New York City is doing and focusing our attention on City Hall," Eli Martin's NPR driver and co-founder of Chicago Rideshare Advocates told NPR.

Martin says the vast majority of Chicago drivers do not seek to be turned into business employees with health insurance. "The way forward is not to create a traditional union to negotiate with the company," he said.

Instead, he added, most of the group's demands can be handled by local officials. "We are trying to limit the number of drivers, a kind of pay raise" and the city oversight of the Uber and Lyft deactivation process.

With more than 67,000 active Uber and Lyft drivers throughout the city, Martin expects the organization to be able to exert significant pressure on the new mayor and seated sheriffs.

Angela Vogel, a driver and a member of the Philadelphia Drivers Union, said the NLRB is only one of many agencies that can determine the status of an employee. The IRS, for example, has its own guidelines for determining who is an independent contractor or not. And state agencies often decide on eligibility for benefits, including workers' compensation and unemployment.

"So, what I'm telling people, it's just because the NLRB says we're not employees, it does not mean that state regulators will not have a different classification and that's why we have to keep fighting, "said Vogel.