Major Tech Firms Cut Jobs, Freeze Hiring Thanks to Fears of Economic Downturn

Ridesharing app Lyft and payment processing startup Stripe informed their staff of layoffs Thursday in part due to expectations of an upcoming recession, while Amazon announced a corporate hiring freeze due to “unusual” economic conditions.

Lyft announced it would cut 13% of staff, nearly 700 jobs, according to the WSJ, while Stripe announced a 14% cut to just under 7,000 employees — implying a cut of at least 1,000 employees. Both companies cited recession fears and other macroeconomic challenges as motivators for their decisions, while Amazon senior vice president of people experience and technology Beth Galetti simply characterized current economic conditions as “uncertain and challenging” in a letter to Amazon staffers.

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Corporations Stay Quiet on Abortion After Disney’s Disastrous Tangle with DeSantis

Ron DeSantis

Corporations previously outspoken about hot-button social issues have stayed quiet on the likely overturning of Roe v. Wade after a dramatic fight between Disney and Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis over the company’s political activism.

Following the leak of a draft opinion indicating the Supreme Court is likely to overturn Roe v. Wade, Democrats are trying to ram through a bill legalizing third trimester abortions; however, corporations are largely staying out of the fray, following Disney’s disastrous battle with Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis that ended with the company losing its special tax privileges.

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Commentary: Platform Transparency Can Help Build Antitrust Cases

There is growing bipartisan concern over the power Silicon Valley’s oligopolies wield over American society. Amazon alone controls 72% of U.S. adult book sales, Airbnb accounts for a fifth of domestic lodging expenditures and Facebook accounts for almost three-quarters of social media visits. Just two companies, Apple and Google, act as gatekeepers to 99% of smartphones, while two others, Uber and Lyft, control 98% of the ride-share market in the U.S. Yet, for government to take robust antitrust action against Silicon Valley requires the kind of data it currently lacks: documenting the harm this market consolidation inflicts on consumers. A new RealClearFoundation report offers a look at how amending Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act to require platform transparency could aid such antitrust efforts.

When it comes to Silicon Valley’s social media platforms, they have long argued that antitrust laws don’t apply to them because their services are provided free of charge. In reality, users do pay for their services: with their data rather than their money. Companies today harvest vast amounts of private information about their users every day, using that data to invisibly nudge their users toward purchases and consuming ads, or the companies simply sell that data outright.

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Big Tech Companies Are Defying Texas’ Vaccine Mandate Ban

Man getting bandaid on vaccination shot

Major tech companies are continuing to require their employees to be vaccinated at their Texas facilities, in violation of Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order banning all vaccine mandates.

Abbott signed an executive order on Oct. 11 prohibiting “any entity,” including private businesses, government contractors and local schools, from imposing a requirement that employees be vaccinated as a condition of employment. However, Google, Facebook, HPE, Twitter and Lyft have yet to lift their vaccine mandates in response to the order, Protocol first reported.

HPE spokesman Adam Bauer confirmed the company had not changed its vaccine policy, and told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the company was making “vaccination a condition of employment for U.S. team members to comply with President Biden’s executive order and remain in good standing as a federal contractor.”

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Lyft’s Safety Report Shows Thousands of Sexual Assaults over Three Years

Man driving a car with GPS set up on dashboard

Lyft reported 1,807 sexual assaults in 2019 in its first-ever safety report, released Thursday. The release mentioned that in 2019 the company received 156 reports of rape and 114 reports of attempted rape.

The rideshare company’s release listed categories of sexual assault ranging from “non-consensual kissing of a non-sexual body part” to “non-consensual sexual penetration.” Reports of all five categories of sexual assault included in the release increased from 2018 to 2019.

From 2017 to 2019, rape was reported in about one in 5 million Lyft rides, according to the release. There were 4,158 total reports of sexual assault in Lyft rides during those years.

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Minneapolis Rideshare Drivers Experiencing Spike in Robberies and Carjackings

Uber and Lyft drivers in Minneapolis are facing a slew of robberies and carjackings, Crime Watch Minneapolis reported this week.

In an article published Thursday, Crime Watch Minneapolis recounted the various incidents against rideshare drivers heard on Minneapolis police scanners since Oct. 1. The crime watchdog noted that “many of those reports have included assaults on the drivers and the use of guns in the robberies.”

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Taking Down Pro-Life Websites, Donating to Planned Parenthood: How Tech Companies Are Fighting Texas’ Abortion Law

Several major tech companies spoke out against the Texas Heartbeat Act, taking down pro-life websites and funding out-of-state abortions.

The “Texas Heartbeat Act” enacted May 19, prohibits abortions after the unborn baby’s heartbeat is detectable, with exceptions for medical emergencies. The law includes a provision providing a civil cause of action to sue a person who “knowingly engages in conduct that aids or abets the performance or inducement of an abortion,” and may result in a plaintiff receiving $10,000 or more for each abortion found to be in violation of the law.

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Lack of Drivers Is a ‘Reckoning’ for Uber, Executive Says

Ride-share companies like Uber and Lyft have been using incentives to make the gig economy more attractive in an attempt to recruit drivers as a shortage of drivers pushes prices up, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Incentives for drivers to return are an attempt to rectify rising fare prices and a lack of drivers in the market, but the labor scarcity isn’t supposed to end soon, the WSJ reported. Long term solutions might be needed in the gig-economy as a result.

“This is a moment of deep introspection and reflection for a company like ours to pause and say, ‘How do we make the proposition for drivers more attractive longer term?” Carrol Chang, Uber’s chief of driver operations for the U.S. and Canada told the WSJ. “It is absolutely a reckoning.”

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Lyft Opposes Proposal to Impose Sales Tax on Rides

by Todd DeFeo   Levying a sales tax on transportation network companies in Ohio could have a potentially dangerous effect on the state’s residents, Lyft told members of the Ohio House Finance Committee. State lawmakers are looking to mandate ride-sharing companies such as Uber and Lyft collect a sales tax on the base fare or fees based on distance or time. Officials say the proposal could bring in more than $50 million over the two-year budget. But, in written testimony filed with members of the House Finance Committee, Lyft said the tax would be more harmful than helpful. “A sales tax – plus the recently increased gas tax set to go into effect this summer – could have (a) severe and disproportionate impact on those who can least afford it, not to mention the impact on Lyft drivers themselves,” the company said in its testimony. “Of additional concern, the sales tax being considered by the Ohio House of Representatives will force passengers to pay one of the highest sales taxes on ride-sharing in the nation.” Last month, Gov. Mike DeWine signed a bill increasing Ohio’s gas fuel tax by 10.5 cents per gallon starting July 1. DeWine originally asked for…

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New York City Just Sent Its Transportation Industry Back to the 1930s

by Jason Snead   At 5 o’clock on Aug. 14, New York City turned its clocks back to the 1930s. The Taxi and Limousine Commission officially stopped issuing licenses to most for-hire vehicles, effectively declaring war on Uber and Lyft in an effort to protect taxis from competition. This is the first of many steps that aim to constrain popular app-based ride-sharing platforms within the antiquated regulatory structure that city officials first imposed on taxis when Franklin D. Roosevelt was president. The package of new laws signed recently by Mayor Bill de Blasio imposes a one-year moratorium on new for-hire vehicle licenses for any non-wheelchair accessible vehicles; requires the commission to set minimum pay; and mandates a 12-month study of traffic congestion and other issues. Once the study is completed, the commission will be able to artificially raise fares and restrict the number of ride-sharing vehicles. The upshot for New Yorkers: Getting around town will get harder and more expensive—mainly because lawmakers have been co-opted by a powerful special interest. The mayor has wanted to crack down on ride-sharing for years. He and others baselessly blame these services for everything from congestion to declining subway ridership. They even claim competition has encouraged taxi-driver suicides. De Blasio touted his victory…

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Leftist Company Lyft Will Drive Select Tennesseans to Voting Booths

Lyft

Officials with the ride-sharing app Lyft, which has a presence in Tennessee, and whose politics lean heavily left, announced they will offer free rides to the polls this election day. But the only people allowed to take advantage of those rides live in what Lyft officials refer to as “underserved areas.” Everyone else, however, gets 50 percent off rides to the polls that day. The Tennessee Star asked Lyft officials Monday if this is their attempt to help elect more local, state and federal Democrats this fall. In an emailed statement, Lyft spokeswoman Kate Margolis said company officials have a track record of supporting various causes and groups. Among them — pay equity, refugees, and immigrants. “Ensuring everyone’s voice is heard in the election, no matter which side they’re on, is very important to us,” Margolis said. “That’s why we are extending discount codes across the country – no matter which state, city, demographic, or political preference.” According to Clarksville Now, more than 15 million people were registered to vote in 2016, but they didn’t do so because of transportation issues. “In Montgomery County during the 2016 Presidential race, just under 54 percent of eligible voters cast ballots in the…

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