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Condiv posted:How does this follow when the taxi companies in medallion areas have their rates set by government regulation? Consider how many states have to have medical insurance price increases cleared by the government, and then consider that those states have the same really high prices as everywhere else. Prices are set by the effectiveness of business executives whining to politicians over lunch, and that effectiveness is frequently high.
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Jul 23, 2014 10:32
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Then prices are high because taxi companies are colluding with local government, not because medallions. Yes, medallions sell for a poo poo ton of cash in a lot of cities, but they are also investments that can be resold and transferred, and they seem to stay in the buyer's hands indefinitely till the buyer decides to sell.
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Jul 23, 2014 10:54
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Which, again is just bullshit policy based on rent seeking behavior by taxi companies. The logic behind the medallions makes sense in congested cities, but they need to be reauctioned on a regular basis so the local government can capture that surplus instead of some private company because they staked out a claim first.
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Jul 23, 2014 11:16
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AreWeDrunkYet posted:Which, again is just bullshit policy based on rent seeking behavior by taxi companies. The logic behind the medallions makes sense in congested cities, but they need to be reauctioned on a regular basis so the local government can capture that surplus instead of some private company because they staked out a claim first. I don't disagree with that, and I even think there should be a second class of medallions for smaller cab groups and independent cabbies.
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Jul 23, 2014 11:43
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Xandu posted:I was thinking along the lines of requiring a minimum fare (like 20-50 dollars) to dispatch a car, which does happen sometimes. Without surge pricing you're back to having times and places where you just can't get a car. Condiv posted:How does this follow when the taxi companies in medallion areas have their rates set by government regulation? The high medallion price is an indicator of high fares. Not necessarily the cause.
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Jul 23, 2014 12:39
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tsa posted:This too, pretending to new and hip and oh you'll meet people while being a glorified taxi cab. Yeah I wonder how many people do this just for the excitement. So will the jobs of the taxi industry eventually be absorbed by Uber et als part-time and hobbyist drivers?
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Jul 23, 2014 13:31
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Nintendo Kid posted:Uber is allowed to operate, they just have to follow laws. What laws do you think they shouldn't have to follow? PS medallions have absolutely nothing to do with any Uber service, becuase Uber does not offer street hailing. In Cambridge, MA the licensing board (who totally had no ties at all to the taxi industry), proposed this a few weeks ago quote:Cambridge’s License Commission will meet tonight at 6 p.m. to discuss proposed new regulations that Uber says would cause it to end operations in the city. Thankfully they walked that back after tons of people complained and showed up at a licensing board hearing
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Jul 23, 2014 14:21
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I've only used taxis a handful of times and I'd say only one of those was a good experience. I was in Chicago and hopped in a cab because I needed to get some place a bit quicker than I thought and told him I only had a credit card and he said he doesn't take them. I got out and got into the cab behind him and told him the same thing. He said it was fine and he told me that it is illegal for cab drivers not to accept credit cards and if their machine goes down they have to get it fixed. In my city of Indianapolis I used to work front desk at an extended stay hotel. We were close to several office complexes and a lot of my guests were IT workers from India who would come there for a month or two and be communicating with their co-workers back home on projects. Bus service sucks so they'd hop a cab every now and then. After a few complaints of high fares and knowing it rarely takes more than 20 minutes to get anywhere in my city, I figured that the cab drivers were joy riding to jack up the fare. So I started printing off directions for my guests to hopefully avoid this. Just as an observer I've seen cabs in my cities in so many states of disrepair it is absolutely frightening. I know my city has really cracked down on cab companies and revoked some licenses in recent years but it is horrifying that some of these companies were allowed to operate for so long. I really can't think of another industry, except maybe package liquor stores, that have such a complete disdain for their customers and scream bloody murder every time someone tries to introduce some competition into their almost complete monopoly. So yeah, go Uber. License that poo poo, get right with the law. But I have no problem with weeding out the poo poo that exists in taxis. Completely mindblowing that credit cards weren't accepted in DC cabs until loving 2013. Credit cards have been around for decades. That is completely inexcusable.
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Jul 23, 2014 14:22
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Condiv posted:Yes, medallions sell for a poo poo ton of cash in a lot of cities, but they are also investments that can be resold and transferred, and they seem to stay in the buyer's hands indefinitely till the buyer decides to sell. This should not be the case. A business should be an investment, not the licensing for said business
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Jul 23, 2014 14:23
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Trabisnikof posted:However bad taxis may be, doesn't mean Uber shouldn't be regulated. It doesn't meant uber gets a free pass to break the law. I definitely agree with this. My idea wasn't serious, but rather trying to point out the opics of the situation. Its like that whole DMV stereotype conservatives pull out to slander the government. By and large my experience with the DMV has been positive so the claim rings false. You just have to wait due to volume. On the other hand any new yorker (and yes, ny is more relevant, because cabs are like a secondary public transport here, not a luxury) can go on and on about horrors stories with cabs. What I'm saying is that telling people to suck it up because of regulatory fairness and urban planning is not exactly very enticing. For example my black friends like Uber because they actually can get a ride. What are you going to do? Tell them to suck it up and deal with racist cabs because of regulatory fairness?
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Jul 23, 2014 14:26
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Colorado now requires UberX drivers to get a physical and vehicle inspection, in addition to mandating new, better insurance provided by the "transportation facilitator". At this point UberX drivers in CO are essentially identically credentialed to taxi drivers.
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Jul 23, 2014 14:29
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Well yeah, it'd be a nice thing if they actually spent the cash to make sure of things like their drivers having valid driver's licenses, but not having to do that is basically their business model. Get hosed, Uber, and gently caress your "optics".
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Jul 23, 2014 14:32
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api call girl posted:Well yeah, it'd be a nice thing if they actually spent the cash to make sure of things like their drivers having valid driver's licenses, but not having to do that is basically their business model. Get hosed, Uber, and gently caress your "optics". Guessing your not black then. Nice to have that privilege of being able to hail a cab. Must be really nice
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Jul 23, 2014 14:46
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Thundercracker posted:Guessing your not black then. Nice to have that privilege of being able to hail a cab. Must be really nice Listen to yourself: "sure my driver might not have had passed any sort of background check, or even have any form of insurance or a driver's license, but he has google maps and at least he'll pick me up!"
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Jul 23, 2014 15:12
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Uber came to Santiago, Chile a few months ago and I'm excited to give it a try now.
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Jul 23, 2014 15:14
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api call girl posted:Listen to yourself: "sure my driver might not have had passed any sort of background check, or even have any form of insurance or a driver's license, but he has google maps and at least he'll pick me up!" That describes so many legitimate cab rides in my country. =(
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Jul 23, 2014 15:16
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api call girl posted:Listen to yourself: "sure my driver might not have had passed any sort of background check, or even have any form of insurance or a driver's license, but he has google maps and at least he'll pick me up!" Uh yeah, I suppose you got me the there. I mean, what's your point here? That regulatory capture is more important than what amounts to de facto jim crow? If that's the case just own up to it.
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Jul 23, 2014 15:24
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Thundercracker posted:Uh yeah, I suppose you got me the there. I mean, what's your point here? That regulatory capture is more important than what amounts to de facto jim crow? If that's the case just own up to it. If wanting taxicab drivers to have driver's licenses and insurance coverage and equipment maintenance makes me a statist then so be it. I'm not even disputing that racism is bad and joyriding is bad and whatever else the gently caress, but without even getting this far Uber flat out fails at making sure you're getting someone who can even drive, in a car that's drivable, takes pride and profit from that, and that's worse. VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE fucked around with this message at 15:29 on Jul 23, 2014 |
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Jul 23, 2014 15:26
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I don't know what other cities are like, but a big problem in Calgary is that the number of taxi licenses is set artificially low to make sure there aren't too many cabs on the road during the day. Drivers support it, because taxi demand is very, very low for the most part during the day. The problem is that this leads to insane (2-3 hour) wait times for a taxi, and sometimes up to 30 minutes just waiting on the phone for dispatch, during high-demand times (weekend and holiday nights, basically). I think Uber is a fairly elegant solution, because it will allow motivated part-timers to pick up the slack when there's slack to be picked up.
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Jul 23, 2014 15:31
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Besides there's good evidence that Uber can be just as racist as cabs: Remember Uber drivers rate their passengers. So hope you don't make your driver mad by being too uppity, or else your rating will get crashed. Uber also tries to get people to upload a profile pic to the uber app (or if you used facebook to connect) so hope you get a driver still. Plus Uber still doesn't serve a ton of poorer neighborhoods. I know where I live I can get an uber to my house, but can't get an uber from my house because the neighborhood is too poor. Plus this is also ignoring the structural racism enforced by requiring a smart phone and a credit card to use.
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Jul 23, 2014 15:36
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Poor people have unlicensed cabs already, they are called hacks. In Baltimore there's a specific hand-sign you use, and I am pretty sure it's a nationwide thing.
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Jul 23, 2014 16:04
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on the left posted:Poor people have unlicensed cabs already, they are called hacks. In Baltimore there's a specific hand-sign you use, and I am pretty sure it's a nationwide thing. Yeah I think that's a Baltimore thing. Edit: even the wiki page for unlicensed taxis calls out Baltimore as having "hack clubs" unlike any other city. Trabisnikof fucked around with this message at 16:13 on Jul 23, 2014 |
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Jul 23, 2014 16:10
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Uber/Lyft: totally not racist
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Jul 23, 2014 16:41
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Radbot posted:Colorado now requires UberX drivers to get a physical and vehicle inspection, in addition to mandating new, better insurance provided by the "transportation facilitator". What's Uber's response to these regulations?
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Jul 23, 2014 17:02
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computer parts posted:What's Uber's response to these regulations? I was trying to look that up because I was curious and found there will still be a few differences in the way they are regulated: http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_25907057/colorado-first-authorize-lyft-and-ubers-ridesharing-services posted:Drivers, though, will not be required to undergo the same criminal background checks that taxi drivers face, an area of concern for Hickenlooper. Taxi drivers are subject to fingerprint background checks performed by the Federal and Colorado Bureaus of Investigation, while ride-sharing drivers will remain vetted by private companies that use publicly available data. But looks like Uber likes it: http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2014/06/06/uber-lyft-praise-colorados-newride-share-app-rules.html?page=all
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Jul 23, 2014 17:08
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Trabisnikof posted:Besides there's good evidence that Uber can be just as racist as cabs: Poor black people don't have smartphones or credit cards, guys. They also don't have fridges! Or, wait, those have become so cheap to own that they actually often do. In fact, per Pew Internet data, smartphone ownership is more common among blacks (59%) and Hispanics (61%) than among white people (53%). That number skews low due to old people, primarily - 83% in the 18-29 bracket and 74% in the 30-49 bracket have a smartphone. Black people have smartphones, even poor black people. (And credit cards too.) So structural racism isn't going to do the work you want it to. That leaves us with "drivers will rate black people down!", which requires an actively racist action by not just one but many drivers in order to affect a passenger's rating long term. This, if imperfect, is a significant improvement over the cab situation where any given cabbie can refuse to take someone due to their race and you just don't get a ride at all. I mean, sure, concerted action by all the uber drivers in an area could result in black people being unable to get cars, but it actually takes concerted action, not just casual racism by one driver.
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Jul 23, 2014 18:05
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Last night I took a cab from the train station to my house. Here's how I normally do it, because sometimes once I get in and they find out where I'm going, they make me feel like a piece of poo poo: I open the door, look in, ask: "are you ok with going to <destination 2 miles from train station>?" sometimes they tell me to get another cab. I'd rather they do this than I get in and they act all pissy. If that's ok: "are you ok with taking credit cards?" because sometimes they're not happy to accept cards for under 10 bux. So I asked the 2 questions, the dude was ok with it, I got in and went. Then I was like, wait a loving minute. Why don't I use a company that will cost me less than 10bux (it was 11.50 last night with 15% tip) for a 2 mile ride, and where the person isn't surly as gently caress because they just waited in a queue for 2 hours then got taken on a really short ride and only earned 11.50? Why not use uber and pay less and have a driver who actually wants me in the car (I'm just assuming here, have never used them) So the next time I need a cab home from the train station, the surly rear end in a top hat "you want a ride to downtown? WE'RE ALREADY DOWNTOWN!" taxi drivers can go and gently caress themselves. edit: for clarity, they're upset they're only going 2 miles after waiting in the taxi line for sometimes-their-entire-shift-so-far redreader fucked around with this message at 19:07 on Jul 23, 2014 |
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Jul 23, 2014 19:02
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I'm not sure where the "Uber doesn't check for driver's licenses or insurance" thing came from. I've driven for Uber and they definitely, definitely check for that. I have no idea where the "doesn't serve the poor neighborhood" thing comes from either. Uber in Denver covers every single square inch of the metro area that anyone would consider poor. Don't get me wrong, I think Uber is lovely for drivers since they essentially completely offload any risk or liability onto them. UberX drivers don't earn much at all considering their expenses and the risk they face (to them personally as well as their vehicles), which is why I quit. Radbot fucked around with this message at 19:17 on Jul 23, 2014 |
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Jul 23, 2014 19:15
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Radbot posted:I'm not sure where the "Uber doesn't check for driver's licenses or insurance" thing came from. I've driven for Uber and they definitely, definitely check for that. Would you be able to give some more details on how Uber is lovely to it's drivers? All the drivers I've met in cars have said they like the service, but considering they're on the clock I'm not surprised they're non-critical. What could they change to be better to their drivers?
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Jul 23, 2014 19:31
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Kalman posted:Poor black people don't have smartphones or credit cards, guys. They also don't have fridges! C'mon dude, someone already posted evidence of structural racism at work with uber. All an uber driver has to do is not take any fares that have black sounding names. Plus, if they're really racist they can drive by the pickup location, and if they see a black person, cancel the pickup.
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Jul 23, 2014 19:36
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axeil posted:Would you be able to give some more details on how Uber is lovely to it's drivers? All the drivers I've met in cars have said they like the service, but considering they're on the clock I'm not surprised they're non-critical. What could they change to be better to their drivers? It's in a way most drivers wont notice. Basically, UberX's liability insurance policies only kick in if the driver's liability insurance fails to cover an accident (which it almost assuredly will if they find out you're driving as an unofficial cab). This leads drivers with a few options in the case of a wreck, report the wreck to their insurance and lie about driving for uber at the moment (only really possible if you don't have a fare just yet), let uber's insurance kick in and pay out and lose your job and your license, or run for it. Also, god save you if you injure yourself working for uber. There's no chance in hell you'll see workman's comp.
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Jul 23, 2014 19:41
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Condiv posted:C'mon dude, someone already posted evidence of structural racism at work with uber. All an uber driver has to do is not take any fares that have black sounding names. Plus, if they're really racist they can drive by the pickup location, and if they see a black person, cancel the pickup. how is this any worse than cabs
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Jul 23, 2014 19:44
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Riptor posted:This should not be the case. A business should be an investment, not the licensing for said business Umm no, there's plenty of licensing and certification that's an investment. For example, your bachelors degree is definitely an investment. So is a drivers license (you invest time and effort to learn to drive, and the reward is greater opportunities all around).
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Jul 23, 2014 19:45
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Riptor posted:how is this any worse than cabs Did I say it was? People have been popping up here pretending uber is a magic fix for racist cabbies/car services, and it's not.
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Jul 23, 2014 19:45
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Condiv posted:C'mon dude, someone already posted evidence of structural racism at work with uber. All an uber driver has to do is not take any fares that have black sounding names. Plus, if they're really racist they can drive by the pickup location, and if they see a black person, cancel the pickup. Three anonymous internet posts?
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Jul 23, 2014 19:46
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Condiv posted:C'mon dude, someone already posted evidence of structural racism at work with uber. All an uber driver has to do is not take any fares that have black sounding names. Plus, if they're really racist they can drive by the pickup location, and if they see a black person, cancel the pickup. Except all my black friends say Uber is way better than actually trying to hail a cab. I feel like like there's a "Don't trust your lying eyes" effect here where all the white posters are trying to force an equivalence, and discounting actual black people's experience. I guess my question for those that say Uber is as racist is that do you actually have black friends? What have they said about it?
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Jul 23, 2014 19:50
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asdf32 posted:Three anonymous internet posts? The three anonymous internet posts show that racist uber drivers use the same techniques as racist car services/cabbies. Would you like to post some evidence that the population of cabbies are more virulently racist than the general population, or some way that uber makes the problem of the racist driver less of a problem?
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Jul 23, 2014 19:52
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Thundercracker posted:Except all my black friends say Uber is way better than actually trying to hail a cab. I feel like like there's a "Don't trust your lying eyes" effect here where all the white posters are trying to force an equivalence, and discounting actual black people's experience. My black friends and I take the metro/buses. Never really discuss taxis. Of course, I live in paris so...
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Jul 23, 2014 19:54
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Condiv posted:The three anonymous internet posts show that racist uber drivers use the same techniques as racist car services/cabbies. Would you like to post some evidence that the population of cabbies are more virulently racist than the general population, or some way that uber makes the problem of the racist driver less of a problem? My random theory is that its probably not so much there's less overall racist, but that the service itself makes it possible to match up non-racist drivers with minority client far more easily. That or the accountability, or "naming" effect actually mitigates the expression of racism in a way that pairing up an anonymous driver and an anonymous client doesn't. Condiv posted:My black friends and I take the metro/buses. Never really discuss taxis. Of course, I live in paris so... Then why are you arguing a point in an issue you have no experience with? I don't go into the French thread and argue that you should embrace our healthcare system do I? Thundercracker fucked around with this message at 20:04 on Jul 23, 2014 |
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Jul 23, 2014 20:01
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Thundercracker posted:Except all my black friends say Uber is way better than actually trying to hail a cab. I feel like like there's a "Don't trust your lying eyes" effect here where all the white posters are trying to force an equivalence, and discounting actual black people's experience. So are these people lying? Just because Uber isn't as bad as cabs in ___ doesn't mean they can't also provide easy tools for drivers to act on racial bias.
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Jul 23, 2014 20:05
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