It’s just a bill
Tuesday, Jun 17, 2025 - Posted by Isabel Miller
* Illinois Drivers Alliance…
In a historic breakthrough to transform the rideshare industry and to improve the lives of drivers across the state, the Illinois Drivers Alliance – a coalition powered by drivers and anchored by SEIU Local 1 and IAM Local 701 – announced on Monday that it will file legislation that will at last secure bargaining rights for the more than 100,000 estimated rideshare drivers who reside in Illinois. At the same time, the coalition also announced that after years of grassroots pressure and mobilization, including many protests and rallies aimed at the largest companies in the rideshare industry, Uber has now agreed not to oppose bargaining rights for rideshare drivers in Illinois.
For years, rideshare drivers in Illinois have been united in their demand to have the right to form a union and to bargain with rideshare industry giants. Thousands of drivers have attended rallies, protests, and regular events and meetings organized by SEIU Local 1, IAM Local 701, the Chicago Gig Alliance, among others. Many of these demonstrations and protests, some outside Uber headquarters and others at key rideshare locations like the airport, have been focused on demanding that the companies agree to respect the rights of workers to unionize and bargain for better wages and stronger working conditions.
The victory for drivers in winning such a condition from the company follows another major victory for drivers in Massachusetts, where rideshare drivers secured bargaining rights by passing a ballot referendum in November 2024. That referendum was backed by thousands of rideshare drivers who had been organizing with SEIU and the IAM. It drew support not only from a majority of voters but also countless community and religious allies who understood that workers could not wait any longer to gain the right to unionize in the rideshare industry.
The breakthrough is partly the result of years of organizing by the members of the Illinois Drivers Alliance and the Chicago Gig Alliance to advance the Chicago Rideshare Living Wage and Safety Ordinance, which, until now, had been set to face a vote in the City Council this week.
Due to loopholes and restrictions in current federal labor regulations, state-level legislation needs to be passed in order to allow rideshare drivers to bargain to improve pay and working conditions.
“This breakthrough would not have been possible without the courage and efforts of drivers shining the light on their safety and working conditions. The Illinois Drivers Alliance, the Chicago Gig Alliance, and their many allies, along with Workforce Committee Chair Ald. Michael Rodriguez (22) laid the groundwork by pushing the envelope at the city level. That forced the largest rideshare company in Illinois to begin reckoning with the fact that opposing bargaining was an untenable position in our city and our state,” said Illinois Drivers Alliance leader and IAM Midwest Territory Special Representative Ronnie Gonzalez. “Ald. Rodriguez’s dedication to improving the lives of workers was essential in paving the way for this unprecedented agreement and the path to union rights for rideshare drivers.”
“This is a historic day for Illinois rideshare drivers, not just in Chicago but all across Illinois who are leading the fight to unionize, which would improve their working conditions, pay standards, and give them a voice on the job,” said Illinois Drivers Alliance leader and SEIU Local 1 President Genie Kastrup. “With state legislation, we will be able to reach beyond city limits to lift up hundreds of thousands of drivers across Illinois. Real change can only happen when workers have a union and a voice at the table. We’re ready to take this fight to Springfield and win the future of rideshare.” […]
Rideshare drivers with the Illinois Drivers Alliance, the Chicago Gig Alliance and their allies will now work to advance legislation in Springfield that secures union rights for drivers and establishes a statewide framework for bargaining in the rideshare industry.
While the details of the bargaining bill are being finalized, the bill is expected to draw some inspiration from reforms recently passed by ballot referendum in Massachusetts, where drivers won the right to a union in November 2024.
Click here for some background on the Massachusetts ballot referendum.
* Sun-Times…
The deal was announced Monday morning, hours before Rodriguez was set to call a vote on an ordinance that would have required drivers to be paid anytime they were logged into the app, and not just when a passenger was in the car.
But the passage of Rodriguez’s bill was not certain. He had delayed a vote on the ordinance last week to allow Council members to ask questions of representatives from Uber, Lyft and the unions.
Some alderpersons supported the ordinance they said would give drivers a living wage. Others opposed it out of fear that the price of trips would rise for hospitality workers downtown. Uber warned that the bill would have pushed the company to lay off 10,000 drivers.
Rodriguez had been negotiating for months with the unions and ride-hailing app companies over language in the ordinance. Those negotiations will now move to Springfield.
* Crain’s…
Marc Poulos, executive director for labor management relations with the Local 150, said he helped convince some aldermen to oppose the city ordinance by arguing it was a bad deal.
“Some of the drivers would have liked it and some of them wouldn’t — 15% to 20% of the drivers would have been laid off. They would have foreclosed an opportunity to get a lot more things they could have otherwise gotten,” he said.
The Local 150 will also support state legislation allowing drivers to unionize. Poulos said it’s unlikely a bill will move quickly because of the complications of imposing regulations on an industry without strict labor standards.
He also said he’s surprised Lyft has not signed the same deal as Uber, but isn’t worried about the company being able to scuttle the unionization bill.
* Tribune…
Because they are classified as independent contractors, gig drivers are excluded from the right to unionize under the National Labor Relations Act, the law that protects the right of private-sector workers in the U.S. to form unions, bargain collectively and organize without retaliation from their employers.
The kind of legislation proposed by the Drivers Alliance would allow the drivers to form a union and engage in collective bargaining, but would not go so far as to classify them as employees. Details were not yet available Monday about exactly how the workers’ union rights would be structured under such a law. […]
“There’s a split in the labor movement over those kinds of deals,” said Gali Racabi, a professor at Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations. On the one hand, Racabi said, some view the abandonment of the fight for full employee classification — and the benefits that come with it — as an unacceptable concession. […]
However, efforts to reclassify gig drivers as employees have largely failed. To supporters, deals such as the one proposed in Illinois are a recognition that “half a loaf is better than no loaf,” he said.
Thoughts?
- Garfield Ridge Guy - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:03 am:
==“Some of the drivers would have liked it and some of them wouldn’t — 15% to 20% of the drivers would have been laid off. They would have foreclosed an opportunity to get a lot more things they could have otherwise gotten,” he said.==
I’m confused. Isn’t the entire argument that the drivers cannot be laid off, because they are not employees?
- Anyone Remember - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:04 am:
===Some alderpersons supported the ordinance they said would give drivers a living wage.===
The “old” Yellow Cab taxi system was set up in the 1930s precisely to do that. When people complained about “higher” costs, Mayor LaGuardia said increasing drivers’ wages was to weed out the criminals / bribe takers. When Travis Kalanick unleashed his “disruption” wages went down and it became much easier for criminals to sneak in and become drivers.
- Three Dimensional Checkers - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:22 am:
Could an enterprising libertarian non-profit try to argue that the NLRA preempts the legislation? Seems like a recipe for a lawsuit.
- Suburban Mom - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:31 am:
===Uber warned that the bill would have pushed the company to lay off 10,000 drivers.===
Uber’s WHOLE THING is that they don’t employ the drivers; they’re independent contractors who compete for the side gigs via the app. What morons are buying the argument that Uber can “layoff” 10,000 people??
- levivotedforjudy - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:48 am:
I take ride shares a lot and chat with the drivers. The companies take huge cuts for the drivers’ services. That’s the problem. But they have sort of cleared the field because of the govt. greed in issuing taxi medallians. If an effort was made to make driving a cab more attractive, it could cause more driver’s to switch and make the ride share companies rework their compensation models. Also, how many jobs can you start and stop whenever you want to? They really seem like the epitome of entrepreneurs.
- Marc Avelar - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 10:50 am:
This is very unexplored territory, given Massachusetts only passed their ballot question last fall and have yet to implement their new set-up for app-based drivers.
Something not being thoroughly understood: allowing independent contractors to unionize places the soon-to-be-filed legislation outside the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), since the NLRA explicitly excludes independent contractors from being unionized.
Per an article about Massachusetts:
“Union organizers want access to independent contractors. They want to operate outside the bounds of current laws [NLRA, Fair Labor Standards Act] that protect tens of millions of us who are happily self-employed beyond their reach.”
While legislation will be filed, maybe a better alternative is to expand Illinois’ current Employment Classification Act that applies only to the construction industry to include app-based drivers, hence reclassifying app-based drivers as employees and would be regulated under the NLRA without having to follow Massachusetts’ untried experiment?
Full article quoted:
https://www.freelancebusting.com/p/deja-vu-all-over-again
- Paul Powell - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 11:04 am:
If Uber and Lyft leave Chicago because of overregulation like they threatened to leave Minneapolis, all of the drivers would in fact be laid off
https://www.reddit.com/r/uberdrivers/comments/1cy28uv/uber_and_lyft_make_it_official_they_wont_leave/
- Sue - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 11:36 am:
Not to sound overly cynical but this entire issue is solely about SEIU collecting dues with which to fork over to more public officials and have them sponsor similar extortion efforts- and we wonder why Illinois/Chicago lag in growth and employment
- Excitable Boy - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 12:20 pm:
- If Uber and Lyft leave Chicago -
That is never going to happen.
- Liz - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 12:36 pm:
Something I’ve never understood: if the objective is to get paid any time the driver is logged into the app, does Uber limit a driver’s ability to log in at any point in time? I thought the whole idea of it was that they would log in and then decide, one trip at a time, whether they would be willing to accept the trip? Isn’t the whole idea of surge pricing to make it more desirable for a driver to accept it rather than say, “no, the weather is bad, I don’t want to”? Or have regulations changed in the meantime to take away the driver’s discretion?
- goober - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 12:58 pm:
a majority of uber rides are completed by people who are essentially “full time” workers, but a lot of people who are registered as uber drivers don’t drive a lot - so if they deactivate drivers who rarely actually work for them, will those people really be that upset? everyone seems to think that every driver for uber/lyft are doing the same amount of work, but that’s obviously not true. putting aside uber’s traditional “sky is falling” argument, they were clearly scared that Chicago would adopt the New York City model and actually raise driver wages, so they’re hoping a drawn out unionization push in Springfield will let them continue to profit off the lack of regulation for a couple more years until they have self-driving cars and don’t need to pay drivers anything
- JS Mill - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 1:01 pm:
= to fork over to more public officials and have them sponsor similar extortion efforts- =
Maybe someone will give SEIU a 747 for “free”. LOL.
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Jun 17, 25 @ 1:08 pm:
===until they have self-driving cars and don’t need to pay drivers anything===
They’ve been promising this was right around the corner for a decade.