# Poverty Wages? Uber Drivers Make $37 Per Hour on Average, Survey Finds



## KevinH (Jul 13, 2014)

http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h

Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.

Barbara Ann Berwick, who sued Uber in 2015, claimed that she should be compensated and classified as a employee. In the course of driving for Uber from July to September 2014, working 60 to 80 hours a week, she told _The New York Times_, she earned about $11,000 before expenses and taxes. "If you work it out, if I didn't get compensated for expenses, I'd be working for less than minimum wage," she told the paper for a June 2015 story.

A California judge ruled that Uber owed Berwick more than $4,000 in back pay, but the decision to classify Berwick as an employee did not apply to other drivers.

More recently, protests against Uber (and fellow ride-sharing firm, Lyft) have focused attention on the earnings of drivers. "All we want is an increase in our wages so we can make a decent living," an Uber driver who participated in a large protest at Los Angeles International Airport in August told a local TV station.

These protests are meant to inspire political action, either against Uber and Lyft directly, by banning ride-sharing or limiting it (to the advantage of taxi companies and others), or in a more general way by getting lawmakers to lump independent contractors in with salaried and hourly employees.

A major problem, though, is that all the data is anecdotal. Do the complaints about making "poverty wages" come from average Uber drivers, or do they represent a small outlier group? That's the question Will Rinehart, director of Technology and Innovation Policy at the American Action Forum, a Washington D.C. center-right think tank, tries to answer in his new research paper, released Wednesday. The answer might surprise you.

After trawling through two websites where Uber and Lyft drivers congreagate to swap stories and share tips-specifically, the "UberDrivers" subreddit on Reddit.com, and the website UberDrivers.net-Rinehart collected a year's worth of information on how much specific drivers earned on the job. After taking Uber's cut out of the equation, the median hourly payout per hour came out to $37.98, his research shows.

That's not the whole story, of course. He found wide variance in how much drivers earned. One payout resulted in the driver pocketing just $2.23 per hour, while another driver made $472 per hour. Payouts over $100 are not common, he says, but they did occur, and payments cluster around the $37 mark.








American Action Forum

"When I talk to drivers, they often cite flexibility as the reason for driving," Rinehart told _Reason_. "This evidence suggests that there is an important upside to this flexibly. Drivers can make a wide variation in pay, especially if they are watching and reacting to the changes in demand."

Because the data comes from websites where Uber drivers are congregating, it is skewed in that it comes from a select group of dedicated drivers, Rinehart admits. It's significantly higher than other estimates, like one from Glassdoor, a job search company that tracks salaries across occupations. Glassdoor estimates that Uber drivers make about $15 per hour, on average, based on anonomously sourced data. A Buzzfeed analysis of Uber data from 2015 found that they earn around $14 per hour in Houston and nearly $17 per hour in Denver, on average. Still, not exactly poverty wages.

Rinehart says his research suggests another important conclusion: that Uber drivers earn more when they are better at their jobs. That's important for the drivers, of course, because it means they can boost earnings through means that are entirely within their own control.

It also matters for the legal and political debate surrounding Uber drivers. While the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Labor, and various state and local agenices use different classifications for employee or independent contractor, drivers have one thing in common.

"Drivers have control over their work, and can be fairly categorized as independent contractors as a result," says Rinehart.


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## MoreTips (Feb 13, 2017)

$37 hour average! Well we know who funded this study. SMH


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

THEY ARE USING SINGLE TRIP SNAPSHOTS...

yes... it's affecting the average..

These trips have zero downtime factored in. None at all...

IN THE PAPER, the say that taking out the single trips out, the average per hour falls to $26 per hour.


Their data is sketchy by it's very nature. Much of it takes no account for downtime,
It's skewed to show the bigger cities over smaller areas..

It also isn't accounting for one simple peice of human pychology...

PEOPLE BRAG!..


Hey guys... look at my $100 fare!


They are going to get skewed results...

If i have 1 $100 fare 10 $3 fares and 2 $20 fares in 12 hours with $50 in expenses...

What does that come to?

$100
+$30
+$40
-$50

$120/ 12 hours

$10 an hour

One hour i made $100 an hour, other hours i was making $2 an hour... but over 12 hours i averages $10 an hour...

This is ONE driver in ONE day...

Their math sucks.. and thankfully the paper says that it doesn't show the whole story,

But unfortunately headlines will follow the title of the paper. Thankfully for us there $2.00 is on it as well.


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## Buckiemohawk (Jun 23, 2015)

When 90 percent of the fare giving to the driver is under 10 dollars than you know its a sham survey.


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## grayspinner (Sep 8, 2015)

The article does not take into account the cost per mile to drive - it is only considering earnings. 

Of course if you ignore costs, it looks like great money


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


No mention of UBER MANIPULATING SURGE WHICH IS THE MAIN FACTOR IN THE ABILITY OF A DRIVER TO EARN OVER $9.00 AN HOUR BEFORE EXPENSES !
Nor is there any mention of Uber governing the quantity and quality of rides a driver is allowed per shift thus regulating the drivers pay regardless of how skillfully he or she works.


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## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

I imagine the survey was done using old rates, today's rates would show a huge decrease in that 37 number.


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## Alison Chains (Aug 18, 2017)

98% of statistics are made up. The figure approaches 100% for faux-libertarian Kool-Aid vendors.


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## Philbert (Jan 16, 2017)

I heard this study got all of its information from drivers posting bragging screenshots on Reddit subforum Uberdrivers. Therefor it is bullshit.


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## ABC123DEF (Jun 9, 2015)

Alison Chains said:


> 98% of statistics are made up. The figure approaches 100% for faux-libertarian Kool-Aid vendors.


No...98.3582358468255% of statistics are made up. Get it right!!!!!


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## d0n (Oct 16, 2016)

It's possible, if you game the living shit out of their system like I did, how many people do that?

I got deactivated for looking after my contracts too.

And this is just horrible https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misuse_of_statistics


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## goneubering (Aug 17, 2017)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


$37.98?????? This must be the dumbest survey in the history of the world!!


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## getawaycar (Jul 10, 2017)

What did you expect? You're little more than a taxi driver. The salary of a taxi driver averages minimum wage or less.
But worse than a taxi driver, you're expected to pay for all your fuel and vehicle maintenance costs, insurance etc. and taking those things into account many drivers are actually losing money. If that wasn't bad enough you're also paying more taxes as a 1099 worker than if you were employed by someone else.

Uber's marketing has done a fantastic job of suckering millions of people into doing this sucker gig.


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## observer (Dec 11, 2014)

"Flexibility as the reason for driving"

Why does that sound suspiciously like something Uber might say?

Oh, wait a minute. That is something Uber has said.


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## touberornottouber (Aug 12, 2016)

I would say $10 per hour is much closer to the median.


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

touberornottouber said:


> I would say $10 per hour is much closer to the median.


With NYC skewing the numbers upwards...

And you can't forget that florida is at the bottom, so we are probably south of average...

$10 is probably not the average or median outside of florida.


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## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

Mears Troll Number 4 said:


> With NYC skewing the numbers upwards...
> 
> And you can't forget that florida is at the bottom, so we are probably south of average...
> 
> $10 is probably not the average or median outside of florida.


Didn Uber get quoted as saying that the AVERAGE full time driver in NYC makes $90k per year?


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

Mista T said:


> Didn Uber get quoted as saying that the AVERAGE full time driver in NYC makes $90k per year?


In NYC that might be a fare assessment, however most NYC drivers also rent a car by the week that includes insurance for like $300+ a week

Once you take expenses out $90,000 is probobly closer to 50,000


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## The Gift of Fish (Mar 17, 2017)

Hmmmmm..... drawing conclusions from non-scientific anecdotal evidence. Looks like reason.com is certainly staffed by the uneducated.


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## phillipzx3 (May 26, 2015)

getawaycar said:


> What did you expect? You're little more than a taxi driver. The salary of a taxi driver averages minimum wage or less.
> But worse than a taxi driver, you're expected to pay for all your fuel and vehicle maintenance costs, insurance etc. and taking those things into account many drivers are actually losing money. If that wasn't bad enough you're also paying more taxes as a 1099 worker than if you were employed by someone else.
> 
> Uber's marketing has done a fantastic job of suckering millions of people into doing this sucker gig.


Uber drivers don't pay for insurance, Uber pays for their insurance. Who do you think pays for the maintainence and gas for a taxi, the tooth fairy?

When it comes down to it, Uber drivers have no more overhead driving their car as a taxi than they would just owning a car. The ONLY difference is they pile on the miles faster.


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## The Gift of Fish (Mar 17, 2017)

phillipzx3 said:


> When it comes down to it, Uber drivers have no more overhead driving their car as a taxi than they would just owning a car. The ONLY difference is they pile on the miles faster.


You're confused between overheads, which are fixed costs independent of miles driven, and variable costs which are dependent on miles driven.


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## at-007smartLP (Oct 27, 2017)

i average over $40 a trip because im an independent contractor and get the details of the blank contract before i leave my house but thats why im in the 4% not the 96% who fail because they accept blank contracts and are coerced into providing free labor.

oh well someone needs to take the 80+% of rides the vets skip


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## PrestonT (Feb 15, 2017)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


The same researchers, based on perusal of forums for compulsive gamblers, have determined that the average gambler makes $273,000 per year and never loses.


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## TNCMinWage (May 18, 2017)

Talk about fake news. This article is simply disgusting.

Last year during SXSW, Ride Austin ran numbers for driver pay based on their time logged in. So it was prettty accurate, although I might log out when accepting a ride on our other rideshare - so maybe their numbers came out slightly lower. But it was at least a reasonable attempt at a study, and it came to around gross of $21 an hour. So maybe gross of $25 -$30 an hour when factoring in our other rideshare.

Most drivers average 30% operating costs in my opinion, so basically net pay of $14-$15 an hour. This is on par with the other estimates someone mentioned earlier.

The crazy thing- this was SXSW - the BIGGEST event in Austin all year when a half million people come to town. Hardly an average typical week, and pay is still well below what this pathetic article states!

Can’t wait to hear about it from pax to set the story straight.


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## Strange Fruit (Aug 10, 2016)

MoreTips said:


> $37 hour average! Well we know who funded this study. SMH


Yeah. I've made that much. For about 2 hrs, minus expenses. It's not the same as going out for 8 hrs making that much per hr. Minus expenses.

And people usually post their outrageous payouts, not the regular daily grinder payouts. That graph is hilarious.



Philbert said:


> I heard this study got all of its information from drivers posting bragging screenshots on Reddit subforum Uberdrivers. Therefor it is bullshit.


I didn't hear that, but the article sorta led me to guess that. I made $70/hr a few days ago, for 90 minutes. Then I was in SanJose at 7pm and, well, I didn't make minimum wage between 7 & 9pm.



getawaycar said:


> What did you expect? You're little more than a taxi driver. The salary of a taxi driver averages minimum wage or less.
> But worse than a taxi driver, you're expected to pay for all your fuel and vehicle maintenance costs, insurance etc. and taking those things into account many drivers are actually losing money. If that wasn't bad enough you're also paying more taxes as a 1099 worker than if you were employed by someone else.
> 
> Uber's marketing has done a fantastic job of suckering millions of people into doing this sucker gig.


If ur "actually losing money" u aren't paying taxes. And IRS has a generous per mile expense allowance of about 54c. If ur losing money why did u pay taxes? If yr income is $0 or less than $0, then whatever percent of yr income that u have to pay in taxes, is 0, cuz any percent of 0 is zero. 50% of 0 is 0. 37% of 0 is 0.
And if I was "actually losing money" why is my bank account not dwindling to zero as I pay rent and eat while continuing to drive, and "actually losing money"? I don't understand how this works.


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

Strange Fruit said:


> Yeah. I've made that much. For about 2 hrs, minus expenses. It's not the same as going out for 8 hrs making that much per hr. Minus expenses.
> 
> And people usually post their outrageous payouts, not the regular daily grinder payouts. That graph is hilarious.
> 
> ...


Here's how the math works..
(this is a fairly extreme example, so i'm going to say this is Orlando) {i orginally had in way worse numbers but i toned it back to be closer to break even..

in 200,000 miles driving uber you can take a $30,000 car spend $20,000 in gasoline (at 10c a mile) and make $60,000 over 3 years.

Your car is now worth $4,000 and you have spent an additional $10,000 total in maintenance over that period.

How much money did you make?

Before your car starts to fall apart, your "Seeing" a profit of $40,000.

Then your car breaks down, and your paying out of pocket to fix it. That $40,000 is actually $30,000. But you won't ACTUALLY PAY these expenses until parts wear out completely. So your still "seeing" money in your pocket that your only borrowing from yourself until your brake pads get low enough that you need to replace them, your transmission blows and you need to pay out of pocket to fix it. ect ect...

Now.. your $30,000 that you thought you made.... Your now sitting on a car with 200,000 miles on it, You need a new car. Your 2014 that you bought 3 years ago? You still owe $15,000 on it and it's worth $500. (it needs more work than it's worth to get it running, so it has a negative value. You paid $30,000 and if you had driven a taxi instead of uber you'd have car with 36,000 miles on it that's worth $20,000.

used for uber for 3 years= $500
Not used for uber= $20,000
difference= $19,500

So you take that $19,500 and deduct it from what you earned...

$11,500
and you take the 15,000 you still owe on the car, and your at -3,500

So while it looked like this hypothetical person was making money every day, all he was doing was turning his car into a POS while not even covering his costs.

But like i said, this is an extreme example, and just a hypothetical.


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## PrestonT (Feb 15, 2017)

That is an extreme example indeed. In 200000 miles driving, my expectation would be about 100000 fare income before expenses. I'm probably lowballing it.


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## Adieu (Feb 21, 2016)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


And as an interpreter, I made a cool $100/hour.

Same caveat: it ain't no 168-billable-hours-per-month job

PS that $472 / hour is ALMOST CERTAINLY misrepresenting a post made by *me*, taken out of context, about making $236 in half an hour... if only it were always 2am 4th July, 24/7.....


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## Adieu (Feb 21, 2016)

PrestonT said:


> The same researchers, based on perusal of forums for compulsive gamblers, have determined that the average gambler makes $273,000 per year and never loses.


$360 million per HOUR

....cuz a 10-second spin on the slot machine COULD land a $1 million jackpot


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## AvengingxxAngel (Jan 5, 2017)

I'm guessing the $37 an hour is before Uber takes commission and before all the costs associated with driving are taken out.


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## Mars Troll Number 4 (Oct 30, 2015)

AvengingxxAngel said:


> I'm guessing the $37 an hour is before Uber takes commission and before all the costs associated with driving are taken out.


It's $37 an hour, while the driver is on a fare, without factoring in expenses, or down time.


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## Oscar Levant (Aug 15, 2014)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


If they are basing their survey on the "partner report" derived from the uber app, the hourly earnings are going to be over stated, because when I get a trip outside of my comfort zone, which is most often on longer trips, I disengage the app until I reach my desired area I like to work in. this overstates my hourly income. I bet this happens to a lot of drivers. Also, factor in depreciation, gas, maintenance, and that figure drops even more. But, $37 an hour? Heck, I didn't do that well when I drove SUV. I don't know where they got that.


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## at-007smartLP (Oct 27, 2017)

if you uber in a 30K car you rode the short bus or just do it to help or pay the note. select dont boom like that people love cheap cant speak for black

xl, selects can be had for 5K low end 10K more than decent to ruin a 30K new model at less than $1.50 a mile talk about ritz carlton for motel 6 rates lmao

people really uber un 30K+ cars? 20+K? quick math tip buy a munivan for 5-10k run it till it blows up & keep repeating while your 20K car sits in the garage unless of course you drive for fun



Oscar Levant said:


> If they are basing their survey on the "partner report" derived from the uber app, the hourly earnings are going to be over stated, because when I get a trip outside of my comfort zone, which is most often on longer trips, I disengage the app until I reach my desired area I like to work in. this overstates my hourly income. I bet this happens to a lot of drivers. Also, factor in depreciation, gas, maintenance, and that figure drops even more. But, $37 an hour? Heck, I didn't do that well when I drove SUV. I don't know where they got that.


its what 4% of drivers get the other 96% fail apparently thats enough to warrant it a legal enterprise.... i basically do the same 30+ mile ride 90% of the time $45-$74 2-7 times a day but highly unique circumstances plus i screen and ignore everything uber sends or suggests its not common


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## llort (Oct 7, 2016)

" $14 per hour in Houston and nearly $17 per hour in Denver, on average. Still, not exactly poverty wages."

Total UBER propaganda. Remove the $.54 cents per mile from the gross, and $14-$17 per hour is reduced by half; $7-$8.50 per hour, as shown on Uber driver's tax returns, and DEFINITELY poverty wages, far below the Federal poverty line. This does not include the cost of catastrophic damage to your car, and major auto-warranty companies refusing repair claims on major components like engines and transmissions because Uber drivers are using cars for 'Commercial use' that is not covered under warranty.


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## roadman (Nov 14, 2016)

KevinH said:


> http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/25/poverty-wages-uber-drivers-make-37-per-h
> 
> Uber drivers who say they are working long hours and making less than the minimum wage are a key part of the legal and political case against ride-sharing.
> 
> ...


am i reading this correctly? this idiot researcher got the pay data from reddit and up.net? does his article even mention expenses? all i hear about is earnings.

after taking out uber's cut the median pay was 37.98/hour. Is he using 2014 data? The rates have been dropped multiple times since then. This is not possible in 2017.

I am a full time uber driver in DC for 3 years now I get food stamps and $9 per month obamacare. After expenses I made $4,400 in 2016. Made $670 so far 2017. full time. This is real data I have tax returns with the IRS to prove it.

These people write about Uber when they have no idea what they are talking about. I've seen the same idiocracy from GMU economics professors who write articles in The Washington Post and have zero clue what they are talking about.

I read every message in the DC forum at up.net. The best numbers I have seen after expenses was about $15/hour. And that was not full time, that was part time working peak demand hours only.


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