How delivery drivers for Amazon Flex, who are contractors, are missing out on the $15/hour pay increase, as a study says drivers earn $11/hour after expenses
except for a fleet of contractors who earn $5-9/hr. As with Uber partners, many of these delivery contractors don't know what they're actually earning after expenses. http://www.bloomberg.com/... Mark Milian / @markmilian : Every Amazon employee making less than $15 an hour will get a raise today. However, there's an entire shadow workforce delivering packages, food and groceries that won't https://www.bloomberg.com/... @michellerafter : “You're not an Amazon driver if you haven't run a stop sign.” - A look at the contract drivers left out of Amazon's much vaunted $15/hour pay raise. #gigeconomy #work https://www.bloomberg.com/... @michellerafter : “Our brains are wired to focus on the incoming amount, not the outgoing costs, and large companies using gig workers are taking advantage of that.” Alina Selyukh / @alinaselyukh : Many echoes of Uber in this detailed piece about the reality of being an Amazon Flex driver... https://www.bloomberg.com/... via @technology
Context & Ripple Effects
When Amazon raised its minimum wage to $15/hour for employees, it drew a hard line between its payroll and its self-employed last-mile Flex drivers — a shadow workforce coordinated through an Uber-like app that delivers packages, Prime Now, Fresh, and Whole Foods orders. A new study puts their real take at about $11/hour after expenses, with some earning just $5-9/hour, and notes that like Uber partners many don't know what they actually net once vehicle costs are counted.
The exclusion matters because the contractor layer was already under scrutiny: a later investigation found Amazon at times used driver tips to cover promised base pay, forcing the company to stop the practice, and interviews with 15 Flex drivers showed algorithms hire, rate, and fire them with little human oversight.
First-order effects
- Flex contractors delivering for Prime Now, Fresh, and Whole Foods get no raise from the $15 announcement, leaving a two-tier workforce where W-2 employees clear $15 while contractors average roughly $11/hour after expenses.
Second-order effects
- The pay gap hands ammunition to gig-labor critics and investigators — the same pressure that surfaced the tip-skimming practice and forced Amazon to commit to paying Flex wages without counting tips or supplemental earnings.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, last-mile delivery consolidates into algorithmically managed contractor fleets whose effective pay is set by app-controlled rates and expense structures rather than wage floors, keeping classification disputes — employee vs. contractor — at the center of gig-economy regulation.
The trend: Platform companies are splitting their workforces into a protected employee core and an app-managed contractor periphery, with effective contractor pay drifting below headline wage floors.