Uber’s ‘partner-bosses’

Uber has long claimed it’s a technology company, not a transportation company, and an intermediary that connects supply (drivers) with demand (passengers). The language Uber uses communicates a strong message of distance between itself and its relationship to drivers: Uber classifies drivers as independent contractors, labels them “driver-partners”, and promotes them as entrepreneurs, although the company faces legal challenges over issues of worker misclassification. Uber relies on the politics of platforms to elude responsibility as a traditional employer, as well as regulatory regimes designed to govern traditional taxi businesses. The terminology Uber uses fosters a certain promise about the freedom of automated systems for organizing work that credits workers with a lot of autonomy and independence.