Not even Ryan Gosling could make being a driver look so good.
Transportation startup Uber announced some staggering figures on its company blog yesterday: the median UberX driver in New York City who works 40 hours per week pockets an annual salary of $90,766. (UberX is the company’s lower-priced service, comprising hybrid and mid-range cars.)
This stands in stark contrast to the average New York taxi driver’s salary, whose median take-home is $38,357 per year, according to Salary.com.
Uber also noted that San Francisco drivers make, on average, $74,191 each year, and that the company generates 20,000 new driver jobs every month, contributing $2.8 billion to the U.S. economy every year.
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“In contrast, the nation’s taxi drivers are often below the poverty line,” Uber wrote, “required to spend $3,500/month -- over $40,000/year -- just to lease their taxi, so that wealthy taxi company owners can reap the benefits of drivers having no other option to make a living.”
Even though Uber boasts that it has served as a business-building platform for “hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs,” many professional taxi drivers in New York also double as Uber drivers -- who work, on average, far more than 40 hours per week.
That said, it is unclear whether the $90,766 figure refers to combined income or if it represents independent operators. Also in question is how many hours per week the average Uber driver drives.
The company did not respond to request for comment.
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