As an Uber and Lyft driver, I can't imagine the ordeal some of my peers have been going through.

I scroll through the app and see that demand is very low for rides due to the panic about the Coronavirus. I see that it takes much longer to get a ride than normal, that everything is slow. I see that the Coronavirus has taken a heavy toll on profits and the ability of my fellow drivers to pay their bills.

All of this is to show that the Coronavirus highlights a bigger problem. Gig economy workers like Rideshare drivers need a better safety net. Right now, they need a minimum wage.

There is a national conversation raging on about the need for paid sick leave for gig economy workers. Right now, gig economy workers do not get that sick leave. And right now, gig economy workers are suffering from the panic. quarantines, and self-imposed isolation from the Coronavirus.

Right now, a plethora of companies are advising their workers to work from home. The clear correlation of working from home means that people are using significantly fewer rideshare services.

For Uber and Lyft, this means signifcantly less revenue. But it also means that because of the contractor business model of the companies, Uber and Lyft are much less accountable to their employees and drivers, and leaving its drivers to the dust.

In the past week, Rideshare drivers filed lawsuits against Uber and Lyft, wanting to gain employee classification and sick leave benefits. Without paid sick leave, a lot of drivers are not being paid for their loyalty to the companies. Although they aren't making as much revenue, Uber has a moral obligation to pay its drivers, especially drivers that can't work due to being sick themselves.

Uber and Lyft drivers need to survive and pay their rent. Uber has offered up to 14 days of paid time to drivers if they contract the Coronavirus, but with the limited amount of testing kits and reagents, how many Uber and Lyft drivers are even going to be tested in the first place?

The decision from Uber to offer paid leave to drivers that contract the disease is an easy cop-out. As of now, it will pay none of its drivers, since the amount of people tested in the United States is still extremely limited.

I wrote before about how as an Uber driver, I didn't want to be an employee. I didn't want to be a contractor either, and yearned for a third classification that gave drivers minimum wage, and the right to unionize while still giving the flexibility that came with being a driver.

Right now, it isn't the livelihoods of Silicon Valley corporations that matters. It is their workforce. It's extremely more likely that CEOs and executives will be fine, while drivers will not be.

That is why the only solution is to treat gig economy workers as employees. Uber and Lyft drivers need sick leave and a minimum wage right now just to survive. I'm lucky because I have a full-time job as a teacher to compensate for my lack of dependence as a gig economy worker, but what about people who depend on being drivers as all they have? Can a driver seriously work remotely from home? Can a driver actually afford to not work when they're sick when they're not being compensated?

To me, it's sad that it takes a global public health pandemic like the Coronavirus to even make the lack of social safety net for gig economy workers a conversation. But it must be. Now is the time where we need to advocate for gig economy workers to be treated like employees.

With the rapidly evolving news cycle and declarations regarding the Coronavirus, we have no other choice.