duxut_staglatz

What's the new category? Currently in France there is:

- employment where you trade liberty (i.e. subordination) against protection (can't be fired at will, minimum wage, guaranteed income set in the contract...) from a company

- being an independent worker where you keep your liberty and do not get protection

If there is a third category like what Uber is currently doing, you trade your liberty (subordination) against no protection. It is not a new category, it is lowering the protection of employment. Which may or may not be a good thing, that's not my point, but I fail to see where's the new category of work.

You are conflating Uber and the Uber driver.

The driver does not quote anything, Uber does and both the driver and the customer accept or not.

They have a very limited way to choose the ride they take: they have to make the decision in a couple of seconds, they may not know the destination and they are punished for declining too many rides by Uber. Does not scream free choice of what ride to take.

It is possible to bypass Uber and exchange numbers, yes. But the Uber platform itself does not let you build your own clientele, such as letting you look for the clients you want or the other way around. The question is not whether drivers can build their clientele outside of Uber but inside of Uber.

They do indeed have flexible hours, something that is apparently - reading the comments of this thread - impossible as an employee in the US and thus a feature of being an independent worker, but in France you can be an employee and have flexible hours, so that does not make Uber drivers independent.

Only if Uber chooses to, it does not have to.

Yes. Changing the itinerary as well.

There is nothing that prevents Uber from providing flexibility. The court has not ruled that Uber contracts were illegal, but that they were employment contracts (obviously, with the flexible hours Uber is known for) rather than (Uber) company to (the driver's) company business contracts.

Are you implying that French courts change their rulings to benefit the government policies (hurting foreign companies in this case) rather than simply basing them on the law?

While it is possible to argue against it on a philosophical ground, in French law contracts are not the most basic construct, and they have to comply with higher legal norms such as law or the constitution. Hence a contact must be "reinterpreted" (i.e. is void) if it does not follow the law.

> On ne peut déroger, par des conventions particulières, aux lois qui intéressent l'ordre public et les bonnes moeurs.

> Le contrat ne peut déroger à l'ordre public ni par ses stipulations, ni par son but, que ce dernier ait été connu ou non par toutes les parties.

> Chacun est libre de contracter ou de ne pas contracter, de choisir son cocontractant et de déterminer le contenu et la forme du contrat dans les limites fixées par la loi.

Labour law (in France at least, I do not know about the US) is based on - for the lack of a better expression - reals over feelz: what matters is the actual relationship between the driver and Uber, not whether either party felt surprise at some point.

The court merely implements "French labour laws", as it should.

My plumber is an actual independent worker, setting his own rates, having his own clientele and free to organize his work as he sees fit.

This is a different point that the one I made.

Indeed, now they can (but do not have to) require regular shifts.

They cannot force French drivers to work certain hours (under their current contracts), but this is not relevant to their work status:

> The fact that the driver is not obliged to connect to the platform and that this absence of connection, irrespective of its duration, does not expose the driver to any penalty, are not taken into consideration when characterising the relationship of subordination.

> The criteria for self-employment include the possibility of building up one's own clientele, the freedom to set one's own rates, and the freedom to set the terms and conditions for providing one's services.

Do they work with limited supervision? The company imposes the itinerary and the driver’s fare is adjusted if this itinerary is not followed. The monitoring is automatic instead of having a boss peering over your shoulder.

It is called Guyane in French. Given that the locals are not English native speakers, I fail to see how the English name influences their national identity.