but the argument we re making as a coalition that represents millions of americans is that there is no higher priority for you as a business than to keep your employees and your customers safe. particularly for public facing stores who interact with a lot of consumers. so this is their moment to act. it s no longer okay to just sit on the sidelines. they have to become active participants in the fight for their lives. good to talk to you. the kpiktive director of guns down america. top business leaders are putting pressure on congress today to do its part and take action on gun control. 145 ceos from some of the largest companies in the world including uber, gap, twitter signed a letter urging the u.s. to enact red flag laws and expand background checks. red flag laws enable law enforcement to remove guns from individuals that a judge deems a threat to themselves and others. in the letter, the executives
the gig economy including ride share services like uber and lyft. they consider their drivers to be independent contractors and not employees. and both companies said they will fight the law. uber s chief legal officer told reporters that several previous rulings have found the drivers work is outside the usual course of uber s business which is serving as a technology platform for several different types of digital marketplaces. this is key to this whole argument. a lyft spokesperson says, quote, we are fully prepared to take this issue to the voters of california to preserve the freedom and access drivers and riders want and need. this exempts workers in a number of professions including doctors, dentist, lawyers, hair stylists, accountants. joining me is a staff writer at the new yorker who writes about the gig economy among other things. and she s also the author of black edge.
thank you for joining me. good to be here. to some this would be obvious. of course drivers are central to uber and lyft s business. so how could they get around that law? but uber and lyft have a different argument entirely. well, of course. it s patently absurd on the surface that the drivers do not work for uber. when you look at it, uber does not direct those drivers. the drivers don t report to managers at uber. uber is simply providing an app, a piece of software that makes it possible for the drivers to connect with people who want rides. and i ve noted that the ceo of uber has been going around describing drivers at microentrepreneurs. that s how they re trying to characterize their drivers. we have talked to people in the gig economy to tell you about the freedom they ve got the fact that they kind of do in some cases run their own business.