DoorDash pilots benefits savings program for Pennsylvania workers

DoorDash will pilot a portable benefits savings program in Pennsylvania to help workers with expenses like health insurance and emergency savings, the company announced on April 3.

The delivery company will partner with Stride Health, a benefits platform for independent contractors, on the pilot, which will take place over the next six months. “Dashers” (the company’s term for workers who pick up and deliver orders) earning at least $1,000 in the second quarter will be eligible to open a benefit savings account, and DoorDash will contribute deposits that amount to 4% of their pre-tip earnings each month. The money that goes into this account can then be used for health insurance, retirement savings, or paid time-off, for example.

DoorDash already partners with Stride Health to help workers find health insurance through national and statewide marketplaces. This is the first benefit the company will offer geared specifically toward retirement, Eli Scheinholtz, senior manager of public affairs communications, said via email.

The downsides of “dashing.” One of the frequently cited drawbacks of gig work is it doesn’t provide an adequate safety net to workers, as they don’t typically receive benefits like health insurance, retirement, or paid time-off. Stride launched in 2014, and initially focused on providing easy access to healthcare for workers who don’t have traditional full-time jobs, Noah Lang, its CEO and co-founder, told HR Brew.

Stride recently decided to focus on savings after hearing concerns from gig workers who said they needed more help in this arena. “It’s been clear to us that there’s a missing piece of this benefit system,” Lang said. “It’s hard to set up a retirement plan on your own, it’s hard to figure out how to set aside money for your health insurance, or even your taxes, in a world in which that’s not done automatically for you.”

Increasingly, gig work companies are exploring ways to offer benefits to contractors. The financial services company Robinhood launched a retirement program geared toward independent workers on Feb. 28, partnering with Gopuff, Grubhub, and Taskrabbit on a program to match contractors’ IRA contributions. Stride already partners with a number of companies in addition to DoorDash—including Amazon, Instacart, and Uber—to connect workers with healthcare coverage, Lang said.

Affecting change through policy. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro voiced his support for the new Stride–DoorDash partnership, and Lang said Stride is “looking for policy innovation” that would make it easier for gig economy employers to offer such benefits to their workforces.

As of 2022, nine states had introduced legislation “to establish portable benefits programs for gig workers, create funds to foster innovative experimentation in this area, or study attendant issues,” according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. California’s Proposition 22 ballot initiative allowed companies like Uber and Lyft to keep treating their workers as independent contractors, but it did establish a healthcare subsidy for qualified workers, as well.

Lang called Prop. 22 “a good start,” but called on legislators to “create regulatory clarity,” in the interest of opening “the runway for more companies to do things like DoorDash is doing.”