UN Women pulls out of Uber's million-woman employment scheme
The hits just keep coming for Uber this week, unfortunately they're mostly in the form of gut punches. First, police forces in both South Korea and France raided Uber offices in their respective countries. Then, later that same day, a Frankfurt court re-banned the company from operating within German territory over permit issues. Now, UN Women (an offshoot of the global council that's tasked with promoting worldwide gender equality) has decided to not participate in the company's ambitious plan to put a million women worldwide behind the wheel of Uber cabs by 2020. Their reason: the public outcry over Uber's history of failing to protect its female drivers and passengers.
"I want to assure you that not only are we listening, we are aligned," UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka said point blank on Wednesday. "UN Women will not accept an offer to collaborate in job creation with Uber."
The collaboration lasted barely more than a week. "Uber was proud to sponsor the UN Women event last week, and we share their vision of accelerating economic opportunity for women globally," the company told Engadget. "As part of our commitment to this vision, Uber set an ambitious goal to create 1,000,000 jobs for women as drivers on the Uber platform by 2020. Uber will be seeking advice from UN Women and groups around the world on the best way to achieve the important goal of economic equality and opportunity for women." They might do well by not hiring so many hammer-wielding nutjobs and overly aggressive executives.
