Every year I send out an annual Lyft and Uber driver survey to our email list of 60,000+ drivers and eagerly await the results. Even though I’ve talked to tens of thousands of drivers over the years via email, social media, phone and in person, it’s always good to add some quantitative data to those conversations. And it seems like every year, there are a few major findings that surprise me – this year was no different.
In 2019, we collected nearly 1,000 responses from drivers across the country and added a few new questions that we’ve never asked before. Obviously this was a big year for both Uber and Lyft since the companies went public, but what effect did that have on drivers? Interestingly, Uber drivers actually reported higher earnings in 2019 than 2018, but driver satisfaction was down by 10%. We also asked drivers about their expenses for the first time this year and found that expenses knocked earnings down by around $6 per hour.
Since employee status for drivers has been such a polarizing topic in 2019, we asked drivers how they felt about the situation and 66% of drivers reported that they want to remain independent contractors.
If you’d like to learn about the methodology, please check out the official report. And if you’re a member of the media or academia interested in covering any of these findings, please reach out to me harry[at]therideshareguy.com for a full question list and raw data. If you’re a consulting client and would like to review the results, you can contact me directly: harry[at]therideshareguy.com
