Within Uber-Waymo split, a key labor battle over AVs is being waged in the nation's capital - CNBC

The nation's capital is host to a key labour battle over autonomous vehicles, courtesy of the Uber-Waymo split. Two companies that have built their fortunes on the premise that human drivers are obsolete have found something to disagree about in front of the D.C. Council. How statesmanlike. The bill is about AVs, but the real question is which algorithm gets to eat first. The Council can now claim it is taking a brave stand on the future of transport, a bit like congratulating a weathervane for being windy.

Crystal Middleton, a rideshare driver, put it with a directness no PR department could match: Waymo 'will put thousands of drivers like myself out of work.' She said this in a city that has employed as many as 35,000 gig work drivers. Thirty-five thousand people whose jobs depend on the very traffic jams self-driving cars are designed to solve. Naturally, the debate will be framed as innovation vs. regulation, with the 'innovation' belonging to corporations that have never once used the phrase 'gig work driver' without a lawyer present. And when the hearing ends, the drivers can comfort themselves with the knowledge that the Council has heard them — which is not the same as listening, but it photographs well.

The Uber-Waymo split means the Council will receive competing versions of the future, each with its own lobbyists and white papers. Uber will presumably argue that it cares about drivers; Waymo will presumably argue that it cares about safety; both will donate to whichever councillors smile. Meanwhile the 35,000 gig workers will wait to find out whether the 'disruption' they keep hearing about will be the kind that leaves them with a job or the kind that leaves them with a lawsuit. The labour battle is being waged in the nation's capital, which is fitting, because that is where promises go to be heard and then quietly archived. No doubt the bill will be amended, watered down, and eventually celebrated as a compromise by exactly the people whose jobs are on the line.