The ride-sharing industry works because it provides two crucial things: on-demand rides for customers, and flexible employment for drivers. Unfortunately, a ballot measure just approved by Massachusetts voters may mean the end of the road for this successful operation—at least as we know it—because it will take away drivers’ independence and turn union leaders and government officials into backseat drivers. The newly approved ballot measure “provide(s) transportation network drivers the option to form unions to collectively bargain with transportation network companies regarding wages, benefits, and terms and conditions of work.” The plain text would appear to give drivers the right to vote in a union election, with the assumption that at least 50% of drivers would have to vote in favor of the union for one to form. But according to the law, no election is necessary to unionize, nor would a majority of drivers have to support it. Rather, if a driver organization (a union) obtains the signed authorizations of as few as one out of every eight drivers, the state Employment Relations Board can “designate a driver organization as the exclusive bargaining representative for all drivers.” Thus, 100% of ride-sharing drivers in Massachusetts could be forced into exclusive union representation without a single vote being cast, and with a mere 12.5% of ride-sharing drivers authorizing a particular union to represent them. (Authorization is required by 25% of “active drivers,” who are defined as the top 50% of drivers; thus authorization can come from 12.5% of all drivers.) The law also provides a pathway whereby a driver organization can petition the Employment Relations Board to hold an election among drivers if a mere 2.5% of drivers (5% of active ones) have authorized it. So why would this matter? Consider why ridesharing platforms work so well: They’re built on real-time market demand. They match drivers with riders instantaneously and respond to surges in demand through dynamic pricing that incentivizes more drivers to enter the platform by raising ride prices. Unions, by contrast, lock workers and employers into minimum three-year contracts. And while drivers can freely enter and exit ride-sharing platforms at any time, unions impose strict schedules that can lead to forced overtime. Most people desire some flexibility in their work schedule. Others prioritize flexibility over everything else and wouldn’t be able to work at all if they couldn’t control their schedule. According to the Freelancing in America report, more than half of the roughly 64 million Americans who performed independent work in 2023 said that they can’t work for a traditional employer because of their own health condition or their family caregiving needs. As an economist and working mother, I’ve been fascinated with the concept of flexibility as a previously “immeasurable” component of work and compensation. And then came an economic analysis of more than 200,000 active Uber drivers that pegged the value of Uber’s fully flexible platform at about 40% of workers earnings, or more than $150 per week for the average Uber driver. The study compared Uber’s platform to a taxicab structure in which workers must commit to a set schedule on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. It found that while the average Uber driver works just over 16 hours a week with fully flexible hours, they would work only 2.9 hours if they had to commit to a weekly schedule and wouldn’t work at all if they had to commit to a monthly schedule. Unions insert rigidity and one-size-fits-all contract rules that negate the value of ride-sharing platforms for drivers and riders. Unions’ cartel-like control over labor would prevent ride-sharing platforms from responding to customers’ needs, likely leaving some people without rides. That could be particularly harmful considering that ridesharing has been shown to reduce alcohol-related traffic accidents and deaths. And unions’ compensation demands would almost certainly drive up the cost of rides for customers, and their “worker protections” could limit access to ride-sharing in some communities. Higher prices and limited access could particularly harm low-income individuals and families who don’t own cars. A study of New York City ride-sharing services found that Uber picks up riders in low-income, minority communities at a rate of more than three times that of taxicabs. That was before the NYC taxicab union and city lawmakers meddled with ride-sharing platforms’ market-based structure, imposing driver limits, minimum wages, and increased fees—all of which backfired for drivers and riders alike. Instead of eliminating a style of work that appeals to many people and that expands access and affordability of goods and services to others, the focus for expanding good jobs should be on removing government-imposed barriers to their creation. Like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, the problem with trying to turn flexible, gig-economy, ride-sharing jobs into structured employment is that some workers simply don’t fit the mold. Throwing out the jobs of current ride-sharing drivers who don’t fit a union-imposed mold will almost certainly make transportation less accessible and less affordable. Originally published by msn.com The post Ride-Sharing Roadblocks Could Destroy Successful Platforms Such as Uber, Lyft appeared first on The Daily Signal.

In the latest big-name bomb to befall Hollywood in a rough few years for the silver screen, Tom Hanks' "Here" opened at just under $5 million and looks set to lose big money for producer Miramax and distributor Sony. Despite a wide opening (2,647 theaters) and big-name stars (Hanks and...

In the basement of Bandit’s Cantina Editor’s Note: You never know what’s behind the scenes with a custom bike builder. We’ve worked with Bill May for decades and recently he revealed his inner interests. He has the knowledge and has followed the UFO topic since ’64. We need to know what happening, so we’re starting a department in the basement and Bill will keep us up on his investigations. Hang on! My name is Bill May. I seem to have been involved on the edge of UFO stuff since 1964. Maybe it is because I was born in 1947. In 1964 I observed a very high blimp shaped object overhead in a clear sky about 2:00 in the afternoon. I was riding in a pickup with my mother and stepfather. I couldn’t get either one of them to look at it. I thought at the time that was strange. I was 17 at the time. I graduated from high school in 1965. I immediately joined the Navy. They sent me to aviation electronics school in Memphis and then sent me to NAAS Fallon Nevada for the rest of my enlistment. I got to watch the Air Force put an engine in a SR71 in 1968. They told us not to talk about it and we didn’t. I got out in ’69 and rode a Harley from Fallon to Oklahoma City the northern route through Wyoming. In ’71 I got married and in ’72 we moved to Vernal Utah where I worked as a welder in an oil field machine shop. I never heard about any aliens or UFOs in the Uinta basin during that time. I split with my wife and moved back to Oklahoma in January 1973. I worked as a welder and as a truck mechanic through the rest of the ’70s. In ’77 I married again and had a little daughter. Five years later that marriage fell apart and I was single again. All those years I remained very interested in the UFO topic. I watched every documentary on the subject I could find. I read books on the subject. In ’82 I was single again and working at a food delivery company as their truck maintenance man. I got involved with a lady in their finance department. We were a perfect match. She shared my sense of adventure. We rode a motorcycle to San Francisco and back. We decided to move to Reno and get jobs. She had a daughter the same age as mine. We made the move to Reno with a large travel trailer and lived in it for about a year. During that time we got married and had a son. We could never seem to earn enough to buy a home in Reno so in February of ’88 I rode my motorcycle to Las Vegas and got a job. I left the bike with a friend and flew back to Reno and moved my family. We got good jobs in Las Vegas.  We made new friends and started hearing about John Lear and Area 51. One of my friends was a young air Force lieutenant named Jack. In the summer of ’88 I asked Jack about what he had heard regarding the presence of aliens at Area 51. He said the rumor was there were three types living there. A short gray, a tall gray, and some that looked like us. He called them ebbies. That was the first time I had ever heard that term. Now it is common. The following May the Bob Lazar story broke and I started paying attention to our local investigative reporter George Knapp. He was not only on tv, he wrote for the weekly news magazines free everywhere because they advertised Las Vegas. The main one was called the Mercury. The other one was simply the Weekly. George always had a column with good information about local intrigue regarding the mob or political infighting or things of that nature but also anything about UFOs, aliens, or secret air bases.  Around ’92 George took off to Russia and created a series of videos called UFOs the best Evidence. They were available at local video stores. I heard George lost a lot of his own money on the venture but they are great videos and worth watching if you can find them.  During those years from ’88 to ’98, I worked as a transmission technician for the local Ford dealers. My wife got a job with the state in the unemployment office. She did very well and became an officer in the state labor union SNEA. We campaigned for local and state politicians who could help improve worker benefits. I got to know Bob Price and Tom Collins well. At a picnic in ’95 Bob told me in the 1960s he worked at Area 51 installing underground electric cable to wire a secret facility in a nearby mountain for the storage of ET craft. He said everyone was sworn to secrecy but it was common knowledge that was the purpose. The base was originally built in 1955 to develop the U2. Kelly Johnson flew over the area looking for a good spot to test secret aircraft. Later they developed the A10 which became the SR71. Kelly was succeeded by Ben Rich. The pilot who flew Ben Rich out there from Palmdale has retired in Boulder City and is a friend of mine now. The mountain that houses the alien craft is several miles from where the regular Area 51 workers are allowed to go. I have spoken to many people who worked there in some capacity, and most will say they never saw anything ET related. I worked with Wayne Higdon and Dave Rhode at Friendly Ford. Dave and I were very close until his untimely death in December of 2010. They were both close friends of Bob Lazar from before he was ever hired by EG&G.  EG&G had a big office building on east Flamingo Rd. in Las Vegas. After all the publicity they got from the Bob Lazar story they shut down that building, changed their name and hired a third party to screen and do background checks on all potential employees. I guess George Knapp is responsible for that. My wife was in several minor car accidents not her fault but resulting in her becoming disabled in 1998. She also became involved with another man while I was working. I got a job in the state motor pool in 1999 in order to keep her state health insurance. In 2000 we attended our first NUFOC convention in Laughlin. We both loved it. I met Robert O Dean and Wendelle Stevens, researchers I had seen on several UFO documentaries. I also watched George presenting his interviews with Phil Corso, and a young Richard Dolan talking about his adventure writing his first book. Donna and I got divorced in 2002. I kept going to the conventions. I sold my house for huge profit in 2004 and bought a little acreage in Oklahoma. I would drive back for the conferences. Also, I made all the crash retrieval conferences in Las Vegas. I missed the last few Laughlin conferences but in November of 2011, I moved back to Vegas and ended up living in a small RV in Boulder City where I worked on my friend’s old cars. I made the Fountain Hills Conference in 2012-2016. I missed 2017 but stopped in for the banquet in 2018 and won tickets for 2019. I also attended two contact in the desert conferences in Joshua Tree. Over the years I became very good friends with Jim Marrs and Linda Howe as well as Richard Dolan and Travis Walton. After all this study and exposure to the subject and the people involved, I have come to believe that most people who claim to have had an up-close experience with UFOs and aliens are telling the truth. These things really happen. They happen a lot. There is some kind of alien agenda. The government has hardware, and bodies both living and dead are being kept in the most secure and secret places by contractors working for a few secret groups within the military or intelligence agencies. Presidents and other politicians are not told about this. Hardly anyone ever talks even on their death beds because they believe it should be kept secret from the general population for reasons we can only speculate. Suddenly, they are now showing interest and releasing gun camera footage and letting people talk as part of a gradual controlled disclosure. Any disclosure is better than none, I guess. It will continue to fascinate me the rest of my days. There is much, much more information in the public domain now that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that this stuff is real. There are several written death bed confessions such as the Walter Haut memorandum who explained what happened and how it was handled. Real disclosure would be to open up the hanger doors on papoose mountain and invite the press and tell the world the whole story of how they acquired them and everything they know about the people who built them as well as photos of contacts and presenting any live ETs that might be hanging around. Nothing less will ever convince mainstream science and the world. –Bill May Join Bandit’s Cantina and Support Bikernet Content and weird shit! The post EXTRATERRESTRIAL DEPARTMENT appeared first on Bikernet Blog - Online Biker Magazine.

Elon Musk continues to post online that the “Hammer of Justice” is coming to the people who did so many illegal and Unconstitutional things over the last 4 and even 8 years. Just a few days ago, he directly posted that message as a reply to Rep. Adam Schiff’s post on Twitter. Now today he just posted this again as a standalone post, specifically highlighting justice coming for those who pushed foreign interference hoaxes (like the fake Russian Collusion hoax): There will be consequences for those who pushed foreign interference hoaxes. The Hammer of Justice is coming. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 16, 2024 And the Hammer of Justice will be largely doled out by Attorney General Matt Gaetz perhaps? Matt Gaetz is on the way!! — Gunther Eagleman (@GuntherEagleman) November 16, 2024 RELATED REPORTS: Elon Musk Tells Adam Schiff: “The Hammer of Justice Is Coming!” Musk’s “Super-IPO” to Send SHOCKWAVES Through the Market? Musk’s “Super-IPO” to Send SHOCKWAVES Through the Market? Elon Musk is one of Donald Trump’s closest allies. Since the election, he’s spent several days at Mar-a-Lago consulting with the president… Even weighing-in on Trump’s staffing decisions. And now he’s been announced as co-leader of the new “Department of Government Efficiency”. It’s one reason Fortune magazine just called Elon “the most powerful person in business.” And what Elon has planned next could be the greatest wealth-building opportunity of the 21st century. In fact, according to one legendary investor… It will lead to the world’s first “Super-IPO” – a company that creates well over $100 billion on the first day it goes public! And with Trump back in the Oval Office… There’s no telling when Elon could drop this “Super-IPO” bombshell. And anyone who knows about this story NOW can get in on a “backdoor” play to profit before the IPO… Starting with as little as $50. Click here NOW to learn about Elon’s “Super-IPO” bombshell. (Note: Thank you for supporting businesses like the one presenting a sponsored message in this article and ordering through the included links, which benefits WLTReport. We appreciate your support!  MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!)

An Arizona state senate candidate was killed on Friday morning in a suspected DUI crash. John McLean, 68, died after Michael Creel,27, ran a stop sign and struck McLean’s vehicle. Creel is now being charged with voluntary manslaughter and aggravated DUI charges. McLean died on the scene, and authorities reported that Creel’s speed and impairment were factors in the crash. Arizona Senate candidate John McLean killed in Tucson crash https://t.co/SNz1xbq48D — Arizona Daily Star (@TucsonStar) November 15, 2024 Here’s what Fox News reported: A Democratic candidate for a seat in the Arizona Senate was killed in an early morning DUI crash in Tucson on Friday, police confirmed. John McLean, 68, died after Michael Martin Creel, 27, allegedly ran a stop sign and struck his vehicle, according to the Tucson Police Department. Creel is being held at the Pima County Jail on manslaughter and aggravated DUI charges. McLean died at the scene, and police determined that speed and impairment were known factors in the fatal crash.According to court documents obtained by local outlet 13 News, Creel had a DUI case against him dismissed in December 2023.The Arizona Senate Democrats also confirmed McLean’s passing. “We are heartbroken to hear about the passing of LD17 Senate Candidate John McLean. He spent his final days fighting for a better Arizona and we could not be more thankful for his work and dedication to our great state,” the group posted in a statement on X. “We extend our deepest sympathies to John’s family and loved ones.” Arizona state Senate candidate John McLean killed in suspected DUI crash: ‘True public servant’ https://t.co/6vdze3pqxI pic.twitter.com/vZ3ZaxyqLg — New York Post (@nypost) November 16, 2024 Per The New York Post: A Democratic candidate for a seat in the Arizona Senate was killed in an early morning DUI crash in Tucson on Friday, police confirmed. John McLean, 68, died after Michael Martin Creel, 27, allegedly ran a stop sign and struck his vehicle, according to the Tucson Police Department. Creel is being held at the Pima County Jail on manslaughter and aggravated DUI charges. McLean died at the scene, and police determined that speed and impairment were known factors in the fatal crash. According to court documents obtained by local outlet 13 News, Creel had a DUI case against him dismissed in December 2023. The Arizona Senate Democrats also confirmed McLean’s passing.