And how much faith do you have in the complete and total absence of regulation that Uber offers?
They get rated after every ride. Bad ratings and they’re out. I’ve never had a bad Uber diver in about 100 rides. I’d say taxi divers are about 50% fine, 40% below expectations, and 10% horrible.
They threaten the safety of their passengers by employing people who have not been licensed to drive commercially.
They threaten the safety of their drivers by encouraging them to drive while using a phone app.
They further threaten their drivers by putting them in a legal category where they have no healthcare, no workman’s comp, and no tax withholding, and then encouraging them to hit the road during severe and unsafe conditions in exchange for a bigger payout.
They threaten the safety of pedestrians and other motorists by combination of the above two factors.
They threaten legal taxi companies by refusing to abide by the laws that govern for-hire transport.
They rob the municipality, and by extension every person living therein, by refusing to pay the proper taxes on for-hire transport services, thus depriving the polis of dollars that could go to vital infrastructure spending.
They threaten every freedom-loving person in this or any other country by asserting that they are above the law and by using their ill-gotten billions of dollars (earned by cheating the taxpayer, their employees, and their customers as described above) to rewrite the law in favor of their avarice.
They are the rightful enemy of any person who dares consider themselves a progressive, and they’ve hoodwinked you by pretending that they’re some underdogs who everyone’s out to get because they have an app and they’re thinking outside the box.
If you’ve accepted money for the express purpose of taking them somewhere, they cease being “passengers” and at least in some states you are required to have a chauffeur or commercial driver’s license. Getting cited for this in Michigan is a $145 fine.
read your policy closely. you may not be covered at all if you’re using your vehicle as a taxi.
So, in places like Seattle, where they reached an agreement with the authorities, it’s all cool?
The app is nice, but a cab company could do the same thing. It’s the experience that’s the game changer. It’s like being able to push a button and get out of the middle seat in row 28 of a plane and moving up to 2A in first class. The cab monopoly is a model that needs to die.
ETA. cab drivers are treated like crap. The owners consider them independent contractors and they get very little money and no benefits. And they have to work crappy shifts to retain the right to drive.
Thanks for the clarification, furt. I’m glad to know that you haven’t been kicked in the head by a mule recently or anything.
Incidentally, in the State of Washington you don’t actually need a special license to drive a taxi. A lot of the municipalities require you to get a permit, but the test you have to take is mostly about geography not safety. Here’s a practice test for King County: Online For-Hire Practice Examination
But you’ve been told about a billion times in this test that taxi licensing has virtually nothing to do with safety, but have been willfully ignoring it so I’m not really sure why I’m even trying.
The cab monopoly is dead, long live the Uber monopoly?
The Uber model is easily to copy, at least in theory. I don’t see them becoming a monopoly. If they do, we can all join you in bitching about them.
And what’s so magical about this license that makes them so much safer? I’ve had plenty of experiences with unsafe taxi drivers. Including one that was flat out drunk.
LOL, they do not. When I’ve been in the car, I’ve never seen one fiddle with their phone. Most of the time the phone is mounted on the dash so they can look at the GPS.
This is also true for any contractor hired by a company.
Again, false, for reasons posted above.
They rob the municipality, and by extension every person living therein, by refusing to pay the proper taxes on for-hire transport services, thus depriving the polis of dollars that could go to vital infrastructure spending.
[/quote]
They’re not breaking any laws unless you can prove to me Uber is deliberately working in areas where it has been banned.
Your bombastic claims are both false and paranoid. Like the Taxi lobbyists have never tried to influence legislation in their favor. :rolleyes:
You mention “safety” a lot. GreasyJack showed that the taxi driver certification (if it exists at all) has little to do with safety, but let’s ignore that for the moment.
I ask this: what is the fundamental difference between driving with passengers vs. driving with paying passengers that demands extra safety regulation? This isn’t like a bus or airplane situation where dozens or hundreds of lives are at risk, and where simply controlling the vehicle requires intense training. It’s just an ordinary car. Most people are content to ride in a stranger’s car anyway, so what’s fundamentally different in the situation when the passenger is paying?
Given that you’re the authoritarian freak with a cop-fellatio fetish who believes police can do no wrong under any circumstances, you’d be the last person I trust to define “libertarian fantasy”. Hell–Pat Buchanan and Mussolini’s love child would be less authoritarian than you.
Sure, let’s just focus on the short-term, immediate-gratification, this-ride-is-mildly-better-than-a-yellow-cab experience and ignore the long term consequences.
Let’s pretend we don’t all know that in three or four years (if even that) Uber is going to buy out Lyft and its other competitors for some absurd amount of billions.
Let’s pretend that they won’t drive independent taxis worldwide out of business and force the ones remaining into working for them out of economic necessity.
Let’s pretend that they won’t have the money to buy off Republican congressmen and state legislators to rewrite the law so that they’re the only ones able to fully exploit the public demand for taxi service.
Let’s pretend that they won’t treat the Third World like their own petty fiefdom.
We can deal with all of that later, right? Let’s just hope that someone else 70 or 80 years from now comes up with a “better” idea to displace the tyrannical monopoly we embraced in the hopes that it would end tyrannical monopolies, right? Who even cares, we’ll be dead by then, it’s not our problem, right?
In the latter scenario, you have accepted financial and moral responsibility for the preservation of a human life.
I was referring to myself as a passenger. I have health insurance should the driver get in a wreck. I don’t really care if the Uber driver is covered. That’s his responsibility.
Right. Why is that even a difficult question? The current system serves no one well, certain,y not the drivers or passengers, whom you seem to care about.
ETA. This was in response to this.
I, on the other hand, actually do care if the person I’m employing is putting themselves in risk of life and limb for my benefit.
And if their employer is willing to leave them dying in the gutter, then I consider that a serious problem.
Again, they’re CONTRACTORS. Companies don’t typically pay for their contractor’s health care.
That slope you’ve got there would make one hell of a slip and slide.
I’m aware of that. It’s no less wrong when Uber does it than when WWE does it to their “independent contractors” that suffer multiple concussions and broken bones that they don’t pay for.