Ask HN: Whats the worst job you've ever had?
I was a substitute teacher for two school years. Remember how mean we all were to subs in school?<p>The really horrible thing wasn&#x27;t the kids though, but that I was essentially a gig worker (this was before Uber was widespread so the term hadn&#x27;t really taken off). I had no guaranteed hours. Instead, schools in the area would post to a website when they needed a sub. Those jobs would be put on the site and the first person to pick them up would get them. This meant usually a couple hours a night refreshing that page, waiting for jobs to trickle in, and pouncing on them. My only computer at the time was a crappy little 7-inch EeePC with the tiny tiny keys. I did end up automating some of the tedium but I still had to actually decide if the job was worth it -- some of the schools were so far away that it was barely worth it after figuring in gas money, and some classrooms were such disciplinary nightmares that it wasn&#x27;t worth my sanity.<p>If I didn&#x27;t get a gig the night before, I would need to wake up at 4:30am to do the same: shower, eat, get dressed, wait for the last minute jobs to show up, hope to snag one, then jump in the car and drive hopefully in time for first bell at about 7:15-7:45am (differed by school). Sometimes I would do all that, driving 45m to some rural school, only to find later on payday that they had cheaped out and not paid me for a prep hour, saving themselves pocket change in order to screw me out of 50 minutes of pay. With hustle, I could usually get work on school days, though probably every other week I&#x27;d have a day where there was no work (and therefore no pay). I had to wear a suit and tie every day as well (or else schools would complain to my company that I was unprofessional) even when I knew for a fact that the school had a more casual dress code, or did &quot;jeans Friday&quot;, etc. When I was really desperate (if I&#x27;d had a few no-work days that pay period, for example), I would sit at the computer until lunch time hoping to pick up half-day gigs. Again, none of this time looking for jobs is compensated in any way.<p>It was a truly dystopian experience and is the reason I have never ordered DoorDash, Shipt, TaskRabbit, etc. and have only used Uber in dire situations where I can&#x27;t take public transit and I don&#x27;t have access to any vehicle or the ability to bum a ride from a friend. Treating employees this way (no guaranteed hours, unpaid scrambling for individual gigs, etc.) is simply evil.