Image: MARK RALSTON / AFP by Getty Photographs
By Sasha Lekach
Black gig workers are calling out the empty gestures of solidarity and toughen from the corporations they power, ship, and work for as so-known as neutral contractors because the Black Lives Subject motion gains momentum across the U.S.
Black workers affiliated with the team Gig Crew Rising penned an birth letter to the heads of Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Postmates, Instacart and others. Within the letter, gig workers flagged how actions like Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi’s announcement about Juneteenth (June 19) as a paid break day for company workers dismisses the very other folks the corporations purport to toughen.
Within the letter written by Lyft driver Cherri Murphy in Oakland, California, she laid out out how Black and brown gig workers are exploited, particularly for the length of the coronavirus pandemic, for the support of firm executives and plump-time workers.
“This battle is now not most efficient about police killings and panic — it is about each institution that exploits and abuses Black and brown other folks on this nation,” the letter reads. “In the case of exploiting Black and brown other folks, you and your corporations are consultants.”
She known as for one thing tangible for the team: “Within the occasion you are committed to Black and brown lives — conceal it.”
The letter continues with requires for the right to put together, a living wage, and advantages. For Juneteenth, gig workers construct now not comprise the possibility to desire off a day to “stand up against racism” without sacrificing wages. Lyft can be staring at the day as a firm holiday — nonetheless now not for drivers. The firm is web hosting a public online panel.
To embody the which implies of #Juneteenth this year, we’re making it a paid break day. We abet workers to utilize it in a technique that allows them to face up against racism, whether that’s by learning, taking portion in a team motion, or reflecting on programs to manufacture exchange. (1/3)
— dara khosrowshahi (@dkhos) June 17, 2020
This comes after weeks of platitudes and tweets coming from tech CEOs, and now we’re initiating to glimpse some motion. But now, even that is falling short.
