What Uber Drivers Really Make (According To Their Pay Stubs)

A few weeks ago, Uber New York General Manager Josh Mohrer, who has been known to fight his fair share of public battles in defense of Uber on Twitter, tweeted an offer to reporters: In response to articles that questioned Uber’s claims that drivers made an average of $25 an hour (or that the median driver makes upwards of $90,000 a year) Mohrer said he would go on the record with any reporter who took 10 rides and asked those drivers for their payment statements (Uber is currently investigating Mohrer for apparently violating the company’s privacy policy during the reporting of this story).

It seemed as good a chance as any to get to the heart of Uber’s rapidly growing business, one that has already transformed the transportation industry in just a few years, so I took Josh up on the offer and took 11 rides with 11 randomly chosen Uber X drivers and obtained eight out of 11 of the drivers’ pay statements — two drivers who spoke on the record were not comfortable with showing me their pay statements and Uber did not provide pay statements for the last driver.

As is common with ride-sharing services, throughout my 11 rides, the work schedule varied considerably for each driver. Most were part time by their definition (working two to three days out of the week or only a few hours each day), three were students attempting to pay their way through college, one had been with Uber since it arrived in New York, three just started driving for Uber in the week before I rode with them, one was renting his car through Uber’s fleet partnerships program, and another was renting his car from his father. The youngest drivers were 21. The oldest were over 40.

The eight drivers netted hourly wages of $15.22, $21.17, $27.54, $32.90, $36.88, $37.12, and $38.25 — not including one-time referral or sign-up bonuses or one-time deductions. They worked between 5.78 and 42.65 hours per week.