Definitely not feasible to keep drivers on as employees legally. Some issues that come to mind that seem incredibly hard for uber/lyft to enforce but are mandatory for California employees:
* Meal & rest breaks
* Callback pay
* Split Shift premiums
* Reporting premium (if you show up to work, but less work to do than half your scheduled shift)
The only way I see this working is somebody started some "Driver Pool" company that employed drivers fulltime and then Uber/Lyft/Doordash/Grubhub/etc all use that company.
* Extended: https://www.brandonsanderson.com/blogs/blog/i-hate-dragons-e...