The NLRB released the advisory memo on Tuesday, nearly a month after it was originally issued. It concludes that Uber drivers are independent contractors and not employees — a classification that means they have no right to form a union or bargain collectively.
The memo, which comes from the NLRB’s general counsel’s office, serves as a recommendation for rulings in future cases, but will not impact many existing lawsuits.
…She noted the NLRB’s advisory is narrow in scope; it prevents drivers for Uber, and by extension Lyft and other app-based drivers, from unionizing, but it does not touch on issues around minimum pay or working hour limits, she said. “And that’s a good thing.”
Driver groups across the country, inspired by gains in New York and California, have shifted their focus from pursuing change at the federal level to the state and city level.