In August 2014, the online transportation network Uber launched a new service named ‘UberPool,’ which allows Uber users to share the cost of a car ride with strangers traveling along a similar route. In the two years after its launch, UberPool recorded more than 100 million rides and came to account for approximately 20% of Uber trips. But while Uber has successfully facilitated pooling among its millions of customers, it has done little to facilitate a different kind of pooling among the 400,000-plus drivers who compose its workforce: the pooling of risk. In a forthcoming article for the University of Chicago Legal Forum, I focus on five types of risk: health risk, longevity risk, mortality risk, disability risk, and productivity risk. I explain how these risks are pooled in traditional workplaces and why gig economy platforms such as Uber fail to facilitate such pooling.

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