Bashing Uber and Lyft?

[pnwmom]

21. There are 50,000 in in NYC alone.

http://www.nytwa.org/

NYTWA is a membership based non-profit union fighting for the rights of NYC's 50,000+ taxi drivers.

And in Seattle, not only regular cabbies but Uber drivers can join a union:

http://money.cnn.com/2015/12/14/technology/seattle-uber-drivers-union/

Seattle lawmakers gave Uber drivers the green light to unionize on Monday.

The city's new ordinance applies to all taxi drivers in Seattle, including for-hire cabs, taxi companies and app-based on-demand firms such as Uber and Lyft.

Companies like Uber typically classify their drivers as independent contractors. That allows the companies to avoid paying their drivers benefits like overtime and health insurance.

As a result, Councilmember Mike O'Brien noted that many of those workers earn below minimum wage, and they have a difficult time making their voices heard when lodging complaints with their companies.

O'Brien says Seattle's new law will make their businesses safer, and more reliable and cost-effective.

And there's a new union in Chicago:

Chicago’s cab drivers are making history, and in the process making themselves AFSCME Strong. For the first time in more than 30 years, they have a union — a driver-led AFSCME local chartered with the goal of solving tough problems that range from burdensome revenue-raising regulations to police harassment.

It’s quite an accomplishment, especially since it was just early last year that more than 3,500 city cab drivers began organizing themselves into Cab Drivers United, part of Illinois Council 31. Then, in July 2014, delegates to the 41st AFSCME International Union Convention in Chicago rallied near City Hall, demonstrating solidarity with the drivers’ campaign to win a voice in the regulatory process that controls their livelihood.

Now the drivers have that voice. Their new union, Cab Drivers United/AFSCME Local 2500, received its charter on Aug. 1, with hundreds signing up to become full dues-paying members of our AFSCME family.

http://www.afscme.org/blog/taking-back-our-union-heres-how-were-growing-stronger

And according to this, there are "union cab driver activists' "across the country."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2015/01/19/can-taxi-unions-build-an-app-to-take-on-uber/

NEW YORK CITY — Last Friday, in the Taxi Workers Alliance’s recently expanded new offices in an industrial area of Queens, union cab driver activists from across the country, plus a couple from Europe, convened for a council of war.