Thursday, March 31, 2011

Taxi Drivers are like Cotton Pickers in San Francisco, California

I received this interesting email I want to share with everyone today.

Today 3/31 is Cesar Chavez's birthday.
What do cab drivers and Cesar Chavez and the UFW have in common?
Answer we are both share croppers. Yup, pick that ole taxi cotton.
Ever hear of cab driver Richard Edwinson? By random chance or karma years ago after I had heard about Edwinson's state appellate court victory for California cab drivers, I saw this guy flag me at 16th and Potrero.
He was on crutches.
When he got in for some reason I turned around and said, surprising even myself, "Good God, man, what happened to you?
He said he was standing in the cab line at Hilton between two Yellow cabs and one gave way crushing his legs in the bumper of the other.
The old bastard Yellow Cab boss Jimmy Steele denied Edwinson's workers comp claim, but the Court of Appeals reached down and grabbed the case and said it raised a serious public policy question relating to cab drivers and the workers comp statute. Steele then did a u turn and tried to settle the case, but the court of appeals refused citing the overall public policy question of who was going to pay medical bills when poor cab drivers got injured on the job.
The appellate court followed the rule of law announced by the California Supreme Court in the Borello case where the workers had signed similar so-called independent contractor contracts with the boss. The Supreme Court said it could go behind a phony contract to determine the true relationship of the parties.
So taxi drivers were held to be not unlike the share farmers, or share croppers in Borello and were deemed to be employees for purposes of recovery under the state workers comp statute which meant that companies like Yellow had to kick in some bucks for their workers in the field and on the raod. Imagine that!! What a concept. Fair is fair.
Yup, we pick that ole taxi cotton.
Speak'n of pick'n remember you can pick your friends and you can pick you nose but you can't ... uh nevermind, skip it.
Say are we having fun yet and partying on for truth, social and economic justice and the American way or whatever way it really is ... and good for GE ... someday we will get the best tax lawyers money can buy and not have to pay a dime just like GE. Gee.
And speaking of that, how about a book recommendation: "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" by Greg Palast. Does it tell it like it is or what? Check it out sometime ...

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