Uber is officially a cab firm, says European court | Hacker News Reader

Uber is officially a cab firm, says European court

bbc.com

340 pointschrisper427 comments

I take a bunch of ubers, by which I mean I take maybe 4 or 5 ubers a week. Before I took ubers, I didn't take cabs, I took the train. I walked five minutes to get on a tram to the train station, I switched to a train, and then I walked ten minutes home.

I never, really, took cabs. I can explain the multitude of reasons: Cab drivers with shitty attitudes, refusing to unlock the doors and just cracking open the window to ask how far it was you were planning to go: Too short? Don't want to take you, fare is too small. Too long? Don't want to take you, won't get a fare back. I mean, y'know, cab drivers are legally obliged to take you on any distance journey but the lack of accountability meant that they wouldn't. Sometimes there were no choices: Cab home or you won't get there. In those cases, I'd take cabs. The cab driver would be rubbing his eyes, swerving all over the road, tired after working a 16 hour shift, while talking on the phone to, I guess, whoever would listen. Doing anything they could not to pay attention to driving, apparently.

And now I take ubers instead. It's not because I like uber. It's not because I think that the laws around the cab drivers should be ignored and uber should be allowed to flaunt that however they like. It's because I think that, at least right now, uber works better than laws. At least right now.

Is the contractor thing a little bit on the suspicious side? Definitely. Should they pay their "driver partners" more? Definitely. Do I think that this problem is uber's fault? Most definitely not.

I don't have lyft available to me. If I did, I'd probably use lyft. I'm happy with being slightly conscientious and paying a bit more, knowing that I'm not ripping off some guy who can't do any better. Anecdotally, most of my friends think the same thing.

But what I won't do is support the existing cab industry.

According to this ruling, you support the taxi industry by using Uber in EU. Probably the Uber drivers will also start acting like you have described. After all, they are ordinary taxi driver now.

So I guess: Back to trams and walking?

You know what used to happen if I got upset about a taxi driver driving irresponsibly?

I'd call up. I'd complain. They told me they'd take the feedback onboard, and they'd definitely do something.

And then, of course, they hung up and went back to doing whatever it is they did rather than providing customer service.

I can only assume this is because it wasn't worth it to them to bother, but I also know it's why there's a value proposition that supports uber, at least for my use case.

I don't know if uber drivers earn less than cab drivers, but I do know that uber drivers they tell me they earn more that their former cab jobs. I don't know if uber is a horrible company or not, but I do know that when I complain, they promise I'll never see that driver again.

I know that uber will actually show up to pick me up.

I know that the drivers are held accountable.

That's worth a lot. Worth enough to you? I don't know. Worth enough to me that I'd pay more than the going taxi rate, though.

> That's worth a lot. Worth enough to you? I don't know. Worth enough to me that I'd pay more than the going taxi rate, though.

Uber has "invested" billions of dollars (double digits) in making itself cheap. That tells me that if they were even just comparable in price to taxis, they would never be able to survive.

> if they were even just comparable in price to taxis, they would never be able to survive

In the quiet words of the Virgin Mary, [citation needed].

Uber has invested millions of dollars into something. One of those things is, undoubtedly, expanding. One of the facets of expanding is, undoubtedly, lowering fares.

Does this mean that an uber-like service must run at a net loss in order to provide their service? Of course not.

The drivers own the cars and pay for the maintenance costs. Neither Uber, nor the drivers pay for taxi licenses, so they pocket that as well.

Uber does more than make their drivers accountable. Just a few under-5-star ratings can really hurt their career. It's heavily weighted in favor of the passenger, which you might like, but is unfair to the drivers.

>I don't know if uber is a horrible company or not

Really?

According to this ruling, you support the taxi industry by using Uber in EU

Transportation service, not taxi.

Same for me. I absolutely understand the criticism of Uber but saying that they are just a taxi app doesn't cut it.

To add more advantages to the list: Full price transparency, pre-agreed price so you don't need to worry that you drive in circles, no driver searching for change for several minutes until you let him keep it.

And, like McDonald's did for fastfood, it creates a world wide standard for taxi services. I had a driver in India that took me to tourist stores instead of my destination and in Mexico City they warn you about taxi drivers robbing you - all not happening in an Uber.

The local cab firm that exists only in my small home town has all these "innovations" too.

Yep, as do cab firms all around the globe, including apps that offer the same experience with regular registered cab drivers.

Not sure if you're being sarcastic but that's a big overstatement. There are a lot of big cities (capitals) around the globe where the cab industry is a pure scam. There's no such thing as GPS tracking, price transparency, apps and whatsoever. No wonder Uber took over.

That's true too.

Maybe, in a way, Uber was a necessary evil. From following the discussions about it here for years now, I realize there are many places around the world where taxi situation is absolutely horrible. All of that created an opportunity for a bunch of evil assholes (and I'm not using these words lightly) with VC money to take over and earn money breaking laws, knowing in full that the locals will appreciate the increase in quality and decrease in price to the point of actually defending them from regulators.

Exactly. I, by no means, agree to a foreign company stepping over local taxi companies which spent huge amounts of money on licensing and operating rights. But the service plainly sucks for end-users.

On top of that, there are also numerous locations where taxis simply didn't exist.

> all not happening in an Uber

I'm pretty sure similar [0], and worse [1], is also happening on Uber/Lyft, just not to the same scale yet because of taxis services being far more established around the world.

But I don't see any reason why cab drivers would be any more criminal than ridesharing drivers. Unless ridesharing services do some extra deep background checking on their drivers, which I doubt is actually happening.

[0] http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/h...

[1] http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-incidents

To take [0] as an example, the driver was easily arrested. If she had been travelling in a taxi, is it likely she would have memorised the plates?

The use of apps to book rides makes it very easy to trace drivers if anything untoward happens.

Route tracking also makes it easy to reclaim if an indirect route is taken (I have successfully done this with Uber).

Route tracking could of course be implemented with traditional taxis, but at the moment is a reason why ride sharing is considered safer.

> To take [0] as an example, the driver was easily arrested. If she had been travelling in a taxi, is it likely she would have memorised the plates?

It was a he who got robbed by a she and it could only happen because he got drugged by the water she offered and then abused his trust-advance, towards ridesharing drivers, by asking to use his toilet.

Her getting caught on his surveillance cam, leaving the house only two hours later, probably did more leading to her arrest than her being an Uber driver instead of a Cab driver because the victim didn't remember a whole lot of anything after having been drugged.

> The use of apps to book rides makes it very easy to trace drivers if anything untoward happens.

Afaik taxis also keep logs about where they go, tho that might depend on the country we are talking about, just like the background check practices of any given ridesharing service.

But I don't see why regular taxi services couldn't do the background check that Uber supposedly does.

Tho I agree with your last two points, I still think the only real difference here is that criminals and scammers haven't fully adapted to these ridesharing services yet, but the potential is there none the less.

>Same for me. I absolutely understand the criticism of Uber but saying that they are just a taxi app doesn't cut it. To add more advantages to the list: Full price transparency, pre-agreed price so you don't need to worry that you drive in circles, no driver searching for change for several minutes until you let him keep it.

None of the above are impossible to have in regular cabs + app.

In fact tons of countries already have just that.

Sure, but what Uber offers is to make this ubiquitous and save me from having to learn the subtle variations of the local taxi markets in each place I visit.

If there are differences it'd be (partly) b/c of regulation which the topic is all about. By all means if Uber feel like using licensed drivers, cars etc. as they apply to a specific country, they can keep their ubiquitous app.

For instance: enough cities may not have preferred/dedicated public transport lane which makes significant costs based on waiting times, rather than distance: hence pre-agreed price is an estimate at best.

To me: Uber is a taxi company through and through and if there are local regulation Uber should not be able to circumvent them.

Your argument boils down to: they are not taxi service, because they are ubiquitous.

There is nothing about taxi definition that would exclude ubiquitous from it. There is nothing about taxi definition that would exclude companies with easy to use apps from it etc.

I'm not arguing that they're not a taxi service. Colloquially they definitely are, and I don't know enough about the legal definitions to have an option on that aspect. I was just pointing out their competitive advantage over local taxi companies with local apps.

> pre-agreed price so you don't need to worry that you drive in circles

This isn't the case in the UK, it's always an estimate and I've had plenty of shitty drivers who don't know how to drive in London which have added 10 mins to a surge price journey because they've missed turnings, driven round in circles or taken the wrong bridge.

But with Uber, you can message customer service who have a full gps trace of your trip. This actually works, I’ve done it. They refunded my entire trip, and I bet the driver has a mark on their record somewhere.

pre-agreed prices are pretty recent in the US too, I am confident they will implement it in the UK at some point. It just makes more sense.

> Full price transparency, pre-agreed price so you don't need to worry that you drive in circles,

In UK you either get a taxi which uses a calibrated tamper-proof taximeter and published rates per mile, or you use a cab which must offer the option of pre-agreed fee.

This dual system existed decades before Uber.

Great for you, but until Uber I never experienced those things. Because of Uber, I experience them everywhere. I use Lyft exclusively when given the option, and cabs here and there as I travel. No matter what, I'm grateful to Uber for creating pressure across global markets to make the "typical experience" much closer to the "good experience" that you've been privileged to already have.

A tamper proof taximeter is useless when the driver can just drive in circles to make some extra money.

Which is another reason why the EU would want to class uber as transport. In switching from PT to Uber you create congestion, which cities will want to regulate.

I hope that what I said didn't come across as supporting a lack of regulation. I'm pro-regulation. I'm anti-luddism, though, and sometimes it's hard to figure out where on the line I should stand.

The point is not that uber is good for ignoring regulation, the point is that the current regulations, borne from an age where things such as uber could not have existed, don't quite hold up in the age where things such as uber do exist.

If the choice for me is "behave according to inane regulation", or "break the regulations", or "update the regulations to reflect the reality of the situation" I will, in every case, like to see what's behind door number three.

Phrasing the uber-versus-taxis debate without the third option is just suffering under the yoke of bureaucracy. We can do better.

Nope, think we agree with each other :) Just pointing out why the EU would want to be able to deal with Uber as Transport.

The sane way to handle congestion would be to have a congestion fee (as London does) for driving in the urban core. Make it apply to taxis as well as private cars, and the created incentives will balance uses well.

Same. If Uber were to stop operating in London I would just take the Night Tube home or not go out (weekdays).

Win-win. Less pollution and you spend less.

Also less quality of life.

That depends. If your quality if life is measured by nights out, it's true. However if I look back at my life my most satisfying and memorable happenings were either the ones I has to wait and long for, and the ones happened completely randomly - both completely irrelevant to going out or not on weekdays. Your life will not be less if you go out less - go out when you have a reason, a concert, a band playing, a movie you actually want to see, and not for the sake of going out.

BTW, I lived in London, public transport is not at all that bad; it's acceptable in Budapest, where I also used it quite a few times. If you can and are willing to afford a taxi, get a taxi, otherwise public transport is fine. (Not in Cambridge, though, there is no public transport in the night.)

But compared to tram and train, Uber is much more expensive, is it not?

Maybe it depends on the country you are from.

Sure. I pay twice as much, on average, to get home in a lot less than half the time.

I also support public transport. I pay for a monthly pass, every month. Do I want that to be my only option? No.

> I pay for a monthly pass, every month.

So in practise you pay more than double, as the additional public transportation you take is 'free'? Just being curious.

I'm kinda the same as GP. I used to get train then tube, not I get train then Uber. For me it's about 2x as expensive but 5 minutes shorter journey without having to deal with this[1] on 4 tubes a day. This also means I avoid this[2] at least twice a month when the tube inevitably breaks down.

It doesn't avoid the misery of the train which suffers from overcrowding every day and frequent cataclysmic failures adding anything from 30 mins to hours to your commute.

If only more companies would get on board with remote working. There is literally no need for 90% of people to be in the office 5 days a week.

1. https://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/1/590x/tube-596...

2. http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/08/05/17/2B201BF40000057...

You could try working somewhere other than London. You'd likely take a paycut, but you'd also probably have cheaper living.

Edinburgh and Newcastle both have thriving tech scenes with plenty of startups needing problems solved badly.

No, my day rate is 2x it'd be anywhere else in the country and the savings wouldn't come close to making up for that. I also like where I live but that doesn't mean I don't get to bitch about the state of the city I work in.

> If only more companies would get on board with remote working. There is literally no need for 90% of people to be in the office 5 days a week.

This. Worse case scenario in a city with a diverse economy is 50%, that is half of the people don't really need to be there in the first place.

I work remotely for a company who's headquarters are in a district which is a textbook example of bad urban planning.

Each time I have to be there for some reason I witness a sea of people in cars and public transport taking literally minutes to cross one intersection and I wonder - how and why do they put up with this?

Uberpool was usually equivalent to Chicago public transportation personally. Some days it was roughly 20% more, but if my gf rode with me it was actually cheaper and was generally faster or aleast equivalent.

+1 on that. Uber is great for a couple or a pair of friends.

My local (Denmark) taxi company has an app that is pretty much like Uber: I enter start and end address and can prepay. But, they do obey the law unlike Uber.

I suppose Uber's ease of use has inspired other companies, so it's great there was some competition. But now if Uber wants to return to Denmark, they must also obey the law.

I think in Europe we prefer to not have too much "disruption" and "lobbyism".

The big ongoing corruption case in Denmark right now is an IT company that paid for a $50,000 Dubai "research" trip with IT-bosses from the the local government (in hope of making it back for selling too-expensive IT equipment to the state)

There's a lot of people involved -- so far, a government employee has received a 4 month non-suspended prison sentence for receiving about $7,000 worth of iPhones etc.

We had app ride hailing in Nottingham, UK before Uber was even founded. It was an inevitability everywhere.

Rather funnily, we had a Twilio in Nottingham too many years before Twilio was founded.

The difference between EU and American startups is that there are VCs investing huge sums in US companies so they can do mass advertising.

Also becuase of difference between EU VC and US VC: US VCs are happy to invest in something that might not pay off, EU funding are more insistent about ROI.

It's unfortunately not that surprising though. The tech giants have operated in Europe largely without paying taxes. Avoiding corporate income taxes with help of Ireland, The Netherlands and US tax law. As well as avoiding VAT with special deals with Luxembourg. They have essentially operated with a large discount compared to local competitors. It's of course a lot harder to get investments in the shadow of such competition.

I don't think funding as such is the main problem in Europe though. We do have a few really rich tech people, as well as a lot of old wealth. What we don't have is the thousands of semi-rich people in the wake of the tech giants that can "repeat the cycle". Something especially needed since we haven't been spared the increase in housing costs.

Excellent point, especially with the tons of semi rich people. Its often overlooked how young SV really is. The first gold rush was in semiconductors, and the people that made money there invested in software and the cycle continued. What essentially happened is that these "semi-rich" people, as you say, were perfect investors in new startups:

1. They had the money to get the startup going 2. They had the technical expertise to (mostly) select good investments and cut through the bullshit. 3. They had experience with startups themselves; they were excellent mentors and had industry connections besides.

Now the system is in place, it seems rather magical.

What's the name of this app?

I assume he's talking about Moove

Came here to say that, fellow Dane. You don't need to bypass regulations to provide a quality service.

I was going to say "Ironically, Uber has a non-trivial office in Aarhus", which is true, but turns out they have many offices all over the world which is for some reason surprising. Might be one of the larger ones though.

>I never, really, took cabs. I can explain the multitude of reasons: Cab drivers with shitty attitudes, refusing to unlock the doors and just cracking open the window to ask how far it was you were planning to go: Too short? Don't want to take you, fare is too small. Too long? Don't want to take you, won't get a fare back.

None of the above is a problem when ordering cabs from a cab company's app. You don't need Uber to get accountable cabs, or to not have to haul them on the street.

You don't, but I do. All of the above continue to be a problem on the incumbent taxi provider apps.

(For reference, I'm in Australia.)

Good for you. This ruling is re the EU.

You could have phoned a private hire firm? They're the same taxi drivers you're paying, they're just using an app now.

Bit of a silly stance and rant in my opinion.

Find me a private hire firm, operating across the entirety of metropolitan Melbourne (Australia), with a pickup time of under 30 minutes, with a rate that is available to someone you wouldn't describe as "independently wealthy".

I'll wait.

Of course, I've tasked you with an impossibility. You're saying I should use a service that doesn't exist. The only way that services like the one we're talking about work is by having a surfeit of vehicles available, and the only service that has that in Melbourne is uber.

You can call what I was saying a "silly stance", but you're saying that from a position of ignorance.

Perhaps, for a moment, you should consider the outside perspective.

On the other hand, if you do find the service I described, please let me know. I'd like to use it.

It's not ignorance, if there were such a massive opportunity for a taxi firm in Melbourne, without rides being subsidised by Uber's deep coffers, why didn't one spring up?

It's the same taxi drivers driving you today as would be driving you 4 years ago.

There’s a threshold where the service fundamentally changes.

Phoning a cab here is looking for the local cab company number, getting shitty call quality, argue with an operator where you are, wait who knows how long for a cab you don’t how it looks like, explain the driver where you’re supposed to go, do the “fucking let me pay by card” dance.

Even trying one of the national cab company’s app only reduced that shittiness by half. It can be the same drivers at the wheel, the delivered service difference is still night and day.

> Cab drivers with shitty attitudes, refusing to unlock the doors and just cracking open the window to ask how far it was you were planning to go: Too short? Don't want to take you, fare is too small. Too long? Don't want to take you, won't get a fare back. I

You are citing some problems that aren't "uber vs taxi" but seem to be due to a lack of competition among taxis.

- Taxis shouldn't be allowed to reject you

- Taxis should all take cards, and preferably pre-payment

- Taxis should be bookable with apps

- Taxis should compete for service meaning a nice attitude and a nice car will be common.

So this isn't about "uber vs taxi" this is about monopoly taxi vs. non-monopoly taxi. Once the monopoly is out, Uber will just be like every other taxi company. And better still, all the taxi companies will be like Uber.

It might be that "taxi" in a lot of cities, especially US cities, are monopolies, have shitty cars, no apps, rude drivers etc. But that isn't because they are taxis, it's because they are a monopoly. Uber should be considered a taxi company, because they are taxi. But they should of course be allowed also to operate as a taxi, everywhere they want.

> So this isn't about "uber vs taxi" this is about monopoly taxi vs. non-monopoly taxi.

But that's not true. Uber doesn't fix these issues by being an "alternative", it fixes them by switching the incentives around. What this is about is "order a cab" vs. "hail a cab". By letting drivers opt into a ride, all of GP's issues disappear.

Of course you still do need competition once you're past that layer, yeah; taxi monopolies do sometimes offer cab-ordering services but those services still suck (Only available by phonecall with waiting time, no notifications, no prepayment etc). Simply removing the monopoly would not fix the issue entirely.

I'm speaking from the perspective of an unregulated market.

I can order a regular taxi via an app that is as good as Ubers, or hail one in the street, or go to a taxi stand (I doubt there will be an Uber at the stand, but there is nothing stopping them I suppose). Or I can order an Uber-. I'm not sure if I could actually hail an Uber on the street, but hypothetically if an uber driver was idling and saw I needed a taxi, I'm sure I could just take a seat and order the ride using the app from the passenger seat before we drive off.

Regardless of whether I order a regular taxi or an Uber, I can prepay, track it in the app etc. And regardless of whether I order an Uber or a regular car, I expect a nice driver and a reasonably new car (Not rarely a Tesla).

My point is: when there is no monopoly, the others can't afford to have an app, cars, or services that are worse than Ubers. Also, when there is no taxi monopoly, it's pretty natural that Uber is "taxi" like all the other taxi companies. They provide nothing that the others don't!

> But that's not true. Uber doesn't fix these issues by being an "alternative", it fixes them by switching the incentives around

Depends on the market. In Las Vegas, for example, there is plenty of taxi competition, but the taxis only work the tourist zones. The reason the people of LV forced their local politicians to welcome Uber, above the objections of the taxi cartel, is because the taxis refuse to pick up the locals in the neighborhoods. There's no need to when they can make the same money, or better, being lazy working the tourists.

Uber and Lyft have been a godsend for people with limited mobility, the elderly, those who can't afford or choose not to have a car, and those who would like to have a nice night out without worrying about a DUI. Taxis are despised in Las Vegas. Their lobbying power is the reason the monorail system stops just short of the airport.

> Once the monopoly is out, Uber will just be like every other taxi company. And better still, all the taxi companies will be like Uber.

That is pretty much how things are here in Lithuania. The system works well, you don't really come across drivers or cars with issues, and there isn't really any kind of monopoly. There aren't many true taxis, because being a 'taxi' vs a 'private driver' means you pay more effectively just to be able to drive in bus lanes.

Historically people would phone up to book (and a car would turn up in under 10 minutes), but now you can use a single app to book and pay by card with all the different taxi companies (and get whatever car is quickest or cheapest). Uber were late to the game when they entered the market in 2015, and their launch has gone pretty much unnoticed.

What monopoly? There is no taxi monopoly that I'm aware of. If anything much of the problem with Taxis is because of the heavy competition racing to the bottom.

Depends on where you live. In some large cities there is a maximum number of taxis allowed. They have get permits/medallions to operate. In these cities where Uber is not considered a "taxi" they can operate as many cars as they want.

I don't think that means it is a monopoly.

It may be more accurate to call it an oligopoly, but the distortion of the market from limited supply and competition remain the same.

I’d compare it to how ISPs are in the US. Most people believe ISPs have local monopolies which is why Comcast sucks. But we can’t simply change services because laws restrict ability for new ISPs to be started. Same issue with taxis. There are limited options and the medallion model limits the competition and new options from being created to compete.

I never had such huge problems with taxi. Just about the only one I can relate to is them taking only cash.

When I call for taxi, they ask where I want to go, so the whole window situation never happen.

So, Uber is giving you the taxi cab service you always wanted? That's great, and that's why they should be regulated as such.

One could make the argument that regulation got regular cabs to the position they're in today, and applying that to Uber would ruin the service. A functioning system would have been more resistant to disruption. Perhaps the regulations cabs already have aren't enforceable?

Do you have specific area in mind within the EU where the statement "regulation got regular cabs to the position" is based on?

It works better than law mostly because of the amount of privacy both employees and customer have to sacrifice. Most things would "work better" with that trade-off.

Edit: Does this mean people can now hail an Uber without needing an account or the app?

And the tax evasion (executed by the driver, on behalf of Uber). Without that, would there even be uber ?

all the superficial issues you've described simply reinforces how similar new car hailing service are to legacy cabs.

Your argument is akin to arguing juciero is not a juice machine. it's a connected juice delivery experience that is uniquely distinguishable from the act of making juice from solids.

> I didn't take cabs, I took the train.

And then a new cab company came to town, and were sufficiently innovative in the market to convince you to stop taking the train, and take their cabs.

Yours seems like a fairly usual reply when either Airbnb or Uber are discussed - "it works for me". Great that it works for you.

I have never had a problem with the cabs where I live (and Uber is banned)

Anyway to add my anecdote as a counter to yours. I was back home in Scotland at Christmas last year. Private Cabs were all busy, so we tried an Uber wanted to charge nearly three times what the monopolistic black cabs (the ones you hail from the street) charge. My one and only experience with Uber and it didn't seem good.

Cabs are shit in most places around the world. What's great with Uber is that you will avoid that while traveling.

I traveled recently in a foreign country where I did not speak the local language. Uber allowed me to enter my destination and location without confusing the driver. I could never have done this with a traditional taxi cab.

You couldn’t show them the address written down?

I've tried that in most countries I've been to. The results have been hit-and-miss.

Japan: Works great Turkey: Nope. Thailand: Nope. France: Works, but not always well

In a lot of countries, cab drivers are illiterate. And I don't mean functionally illiterate. I mean simply CAN NOT read. Not even a map. If you don't speak the language absolutely fluently, you're screwed.

I could, but sometimes addresses are not so clear. In my experience taxi drivers like it when you can explain directions and negotiate price. Without common language for me that is quite difficult.

I have managed to take taxis in plenty of countries where I don't speak the language. Don't pretend that its something difficult.

Sure it's easy to take a cab. What's more tricky, is not getting scammed. E.g. in Vietnam you'll be looking about various internet sources on which taxi companies are probably not gonna scam you. In France, I had some friends getting scammed in a separate ride from mine.

In general, the ability to know beforehand the price, is golden!

Adding to this: in countries payment can also be a problem, trivially solved via Uber. Take e.g. when I first arrived in South Korea and took an cab from the airport (fixed rates and in cabs in Korea are nice, so not a complaint there), the taxi couldn't take my card, and I didn't have 100k won in cash (accidentally took a luxury cab), so we had to drive around to find a bank that luckily took VISA.

Depends on the country. Travel to a difficult country, or a rural area of pretty much any country, and get back to us.

What do you consider a "difficult" country? I used to lug a kayak around South America with me on public transport and taxis or even the back of trucks that were going the right way (while speaking the language very poorly). The biggest problem I had was getting a taxi in Hungary where the letters look the same but the pronunciation is quite different. Even then it was a case of getting a map out and pointing to the street.

I am not sure how you were able to communicate if you could not write or speak directions, but I am impressed! I don't think it wasn't possible to do before Uber in general, just for my case.

Map, and a finger. Or a piece of paper with a hotel name written on it. Are people really becoming so incapable of navigating life without a phone?

So people before Uber have never used taxis in foreign countries?/s In most countries taxis already have apps comparable to Uber available on Google Play. Even before that, I've managed to get a taxi in China without understanding a single word or symbol (could be said the same about driver and English) and successfully reach my hotel -- showing a hotel's reservation did the trick (I bet that pointing a finger on a location on a map would also work).

Did they really have those apps pre-Uber or did they simply adjust to compete by releasing their own app later? Nothing wrong with that, companies adjusting their model to compete, but at least where I live, cabs hadn't changed their model since the 1950s at least. Now, some of them are beginning to release apps, but they wouldn't have bothered without Uber and Lyft taking their business.

Those are interesting techniques. In my case I was in a foreign country and did not have a map or hotel reservation. I also did not know about local taxi companies. My visit was not exactly well-planned.

If you had a phone and Internet to call Uber, you also had a map. Of course, I don't deny that it's much simpler with Uber or a taxi app, but telling that Uber is the only mean to get a taxi in a foreign country is like telling that people couldn't eat before inventing a spoon.

Yeah my intention was just to share that I found it easier. In my case the map wasn’t working. I was on a public WiFi hotspot and I didn’t know where or how to hail a cab. I’m sure it is technically possible to do without the convenience, but doing all the communication over the app in advance saved me from walking four hours in the rain and likely getting lost.

Counter anecdote to your anecdote: I took tons of cabs when I was visiting Colombia and I didn't know a single bit of Spanish. I'd just pull up google maps, click on where I wanted to go, show them the screen. Every single one was perfectly fine.

Not having mobile data in my case meant that I was scrambling from public wifi to the cab. I could not use Google translate or other tools in the car. I also would have no way to negotiate price or insure that I was going the correct place. Not saying that Uber is the only way, but that for me it was helpful.

I didn't realize that Uber worked without mobile data.

Yeah I actually used it from a public WiFi and then ran outside to meet the driver when he got close enough.

This is the primary reason I use Uber when traveling. It makes things so easy.

I don't think thats entirely fair. They vary a lot, some places good some places bad.

Pre-Uber, cabs near me worth horrendous. I'd book a cab to go to the bar on St Patties day a week in advance, and they'd just not show; they found someone else on the way and that maximized their profit so they grabbed that fair. So 30m after I'm supposed to be inebriated; I call company, they say they sent another, and 30m later it also never shows. One of us then bite the bullet and play DD for the night (group of 5 congregated to share the cab and hitchhike back).

I think 'Cabs Suck' was pretty ubiquitous comment in many many areas of the country pre uber/lyft; it's an industry that needed to be disrupted badly.

Surge pricing is actually a great feature. It’s the low base bay, lack of benefits, and screwing with liability that are loathsome.

You had a choice of NO CAB or an Uber at triple rate. Didn’t want to pay? Clearly someone else did. Economics at work.

One of my early experiences with Uber was much the same, trying to get my family home from the national zoo in Washington DC in a sudden rain storm. Cabs — not available. Uber — surge pricing. Totally worth it.

That said I use Lyft exclusively now because of Uber’s moral vacuum.

We hailed a black cab there and then, so it was quicker than Uber and a fraction of the price. (Just to clarify, the cheaper private hire cabs where you book in advance were all busy. Usually I avoid black cabs - the ones you hail on the street, as they cost way more. These expensive back cabs were still less than half of the price of Uber).

If TNCs didn't exist, then almost all the black cabs would have been in use and you would have been back with "no black cab" as an option. The only reason it's now easy to hail a vehicle on the street is increased competition from TNCs.

It was never difficult to hail a black cab, its just the costs were high.

I prefer waiting longer for a cab to be available, than only rich people taking cabs. With uber at a triple rate, I have to wait longer on average for the fare to go down, than to catch a free cab by chance when the fare stays flat.

a choice of NO CAB or an Uber

That's not what he said. Private-hire taxis are not the same as "black cabs". The first is more like what we'd call a car service in the US (call and schedule in advance). The second is what we know as a yellow cab (hail on the street).

It doesn't matter. Uber doesn't hide the fact that they charge more during demand surges, and the fact that there is a demand surge is more info than cab companies usually provide; typically they'll take your booking and lie about how close the driver is.

I agree, but this experience can be delivered without the dodgy business model.

Hailo did this, all within the bounds of the standard regulatory framework by joining independent drivers to customers with all of the advantages that you provide.

They never annoyed anybody.

Sadly it seems they tried and failed to take on the less regulated markets and this was their undoing.

I miss Hailo and I hope somebody comes along with a credible replacement soon. MyTaxi is just plain awful and is probably the best marketing for Uber round these parts there has ever been!

There really isn't any critical intellectual property or secret sauce that should stand in the way ... just pure graft required.

Hopefully this will do the trick http://www.whistletaxiapp.com/

>Is the contractor thing a little bit on the suspicious side? Definitely. Should they pay their "driver partners" more? Definitely. Do I think that this problem is uber's fault? Most definitely not.

The contractors thing is a tax avoidance scheme at the sole advantage, and responsibility, of Uber.

“Is this contractor thing a little bit on the suspicious side? Definitely. Should They pay their “driver partners” more? Definitely. Do I think that this problem is Uber’s fault? Most definitely not.”

What?

Uber is the sole party that structures the relationship with its drivers and determines the rate it would pay them. Why is it not their problem or fault? And, if it’s not their problem, whose is it?

If you had the option to hire one of two people that will do the same job at the same performance level and one costs you $10 an hour and the other $20 an hour, which one do you choose? Is it the company to blame for picking the $10 an hour person?

The company is definitely at fault if it achieved that $10 rate by misclassifying the individual as a contractor.

Then the government that made the contractor vs employee laws needs to apply it. If a law is not enforced then it is not really a law. Companies are not obligated to do better than enforced laws, they are not charities or social organizations here to make the world a better place, they are here to make money for their shareholders.

I think the EU is doing the right thing. It sometimes takes a while for government laws or competition to catch up and balance out issues, but I don't for a second think that any company is going to play nice if it does not have to.

>> Companies are not obligated to do better than enforced laws

They really are.

You seem to be effectively saying "well, if they can get away with it there's nothing wrong with that"

>> they are not charities or social organizations here to make the world a better place, they are here to make money for their shareholders.

There's a lot more to it than that, we are not a pure, unfettered capitalistic society in Europe.

You are confusing legality with ethics. Ethically, Uber has a lot to be desired.

Uber is a US based company and will try to follow the capitalistic model as much as possible unless restricted by local laws. I would never make an assumption that a US based company's goal is to do good. Assume they are out to maximize profit no matter where they operate. If they seem to do good then there is a driver in their business model where this leads to more profits than doing bad.

>> You are confusing legality with ethics.

In this case I'm not sure I am - if there are laws that companies need to follow, even if they are not always strictly or consistently enforced, I would consider it the legal obligation of a company to follow them.

The thing is, under a lot of systems of law, you don't have that opportunity because you have to pay employees at least a minimum. Using "independent contractor" status to work around that is scummy, and may yet prove illegal.

I have employees and contractors working for me and we have very strict rules on what contractors can do, how you interact with them and when they might be considered employees. The company I work for wants to stay clearly on the legal side of contractor law.

If it is proved illegal then Uber will owe these people back pay and possibly back benefits which might collapse Uber and that is fine. If you want to run that close to the edge of the law then you have to accept the risk. But let these laws and judgments catch up with the new economy/technology.

Well, they are, albeit slowly.

I am a contractor myself, and the law in this area is murky. But in the case of the gig economy it is being used as a tax and rights avoidance strategy, not honestly.

Uber have already lost at least one case in the UK in which drivers sought to be classified as employed.

"Uber is the sole party that structures the relationship with its drivers and determines the rate it would pay them. Why is it not their problem or fault? And, if it’s not their problem, whose is it?"

The driver is the sole party who decides each day whether or not the offer from Uber is worth it.

If drivers don't think it is worth it, they won't do it. If they do think it is worth it, why should I get in the way of their choice?

If Uber raises the rates they pay drivers, rates to customers will also rise. Economics suggests more people will be drivers at the higher rate, but fewer people will buy rides.

More supply and less demand probably won't make drivers happy, either.

And competitors can come in and undercut, as long as drivers are willing to accept the pay provided.

Economics also suggests that worker rights are crucial to a functioning economy.

There was actually an interesting paper written about this recently: http://john-joseph-horton.com/papers/uber_price.pdf

Essentially, when Uber raises fares it increases earnings in the short term, but not long term, because more drivers enter the system and push their earnings back down as each driver gets fewer rides.

Uber could solve this problem by limiting the number of drivers. But that of course turns some underpaid Uber drivers into unemployed ex-Uber drivers. Which doesn't sound like a desirable outcome either.

You take cabs.

You take cabs with a company who have a history of all sorts of shady dealings, a history of evading laws, evading employment rights, evading inspections, avoiding taxes, duping inspectors, not cooperating with police and a ton of other stuff.

But it's OK because you don't like the way other firms operate a service you think is a bit shabby.

You might want to take more of a look around at what you're supporting. Lots of stuff can work better without the laws, until it doesn't and you realise the laws were there for a reason.

So Uber is a better cab service, than the original one. Hopefully the upcoming regulations will result in only slightly increased pricing and a more sustainable system (keeping the drivers in mind).

> Cab drivers with shitty attitudes

Not always rosey with Uber drivers. My first was in San Diego a few years ago: driver had been in town 2 days, asked us for directions, and spent the entire drive asking me about sexual activities he could find on Craigslist that was illegal in his country. Presumably it could have been a fraudulent situation and he was driving for someone else, which would likely get that person removed from Uber, but still, not a great intro to the service.

My understanding is that Uber and Lyft drivers earn about the same. Lyft pays more per trip, but Uber is more efficient at getting drivers a greater number of trips per hour. The end result is that they both pay about the same on a per/hour basis.

And how ridiculous is it that it would take half a decade to state the obvious while this company funded by tech billionaires competed on unfair terms with tens of thousands of tiny taxi companies that followed rules and acquired licenses, expensive mandatory equipment etc.

I would love for the taxi industry to be liberalised but just not for the benefit of a few Silicon Valley billionaires with complete disregard of legislation.

What would it mean for the taxi industry to be liberalised?

At least in many places in Europe (but I think it's also the case in some cities in the USA) you need to get a taxi license to operate which is pretty anti-competitive. I agree with the parent that I would prefer if we had some stringent regulation for taxi businesses but the license system would be phased out to open the market to competition.

Unfortunately taxi drivers can resell their licenses, and they're pretty damn expensive (in the hundreds of thousands of euros in Paris IIRC) so the license owners obviously very staunchly defending their investments and taxi companies their de-facto monopolies. Besides taxis can basically shut down all traffic in the capital (and they're not particularly civil about it either) when they go on strike so the status quo endures.

Where I live, starting a service like uber requires an appropriate drivers license and insurance. No licenses, nothing. (But you can't pick people up off the streets, that is something else, and licensed).

As result, there's many services like uber — but uber themselves is banned, because while the German government was willing to ignore the commercial drivers license requirement, they couldn't ignore the insurance requirements that Uber refused to fulfill.

Yeah I think there's a similar "loophole" in France but since everybody has a smartphone these days many taxis feel like it's unfair competition anyway. I'm kind of torn on this issue frankly, on one hand the taxis have had a de-facto monopoly for decades and as such ended up with a rather high price for a sub-par service so I'm glad uber shook them up a bit. On the other Uber is clearly playing dirty and we might end up being worse off in the end if taxi drivers don't manage to earn their life decently while most of our fare money ends up in some tax heaven never to be seen again.

> As result, there's many services like uber — but uber themselves is banned, because while the German government was willing to ignore the commercial drivers license requirement, they couldn't ignore the insurance requirements that Uber refused to fulfill.

The German government had nothing to do with it. The lawsuits were brought by Uber's competitors under §3a of the Unfair Competition Act [1], which prohibits violating laws in order to gain a competitive advantage. They have standing under §8 (3), item 1, of the same law. The courts had no choice but to rule in their favor; it was pretty much as open and shut as a civil case can be.

[1] https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_uwg/englisch_uwg...

Correct, but the federal government offered to reduce the requirements for running this service for all competitors on the market, according to Dobrindt.

Oh, it appears I misunderstood you. Yes, the federal government was willing to review the regulatory requirements, at least in principle. I was focusing on the last subclause of your sentence.

This happens for a reason. If no licenses are required, the market will be flooded with more offer than demand. Also the environmental impact, traffic jams, etc.

Demand meets need naturally. That’s how all other businesses works.

The point is that taxi is not seen as a pure business. It is seen as a part of infrastructure. Elderly or disabled people should have a reliable way of transport. The goal of the regulation is that taxi companies don't only did lucrative rides (from the airport to träfe fair) but also less lucrative rides (from one's Appartment to the doctor few blocks down) and provide enough (realtively cheap) capacity even at uncommon times (4am or such)

So why are taxi licenses/medallions necessary to add regulation? To provide an incentive to do the right thing? Can't you just fine bad actors up the wazoo and accomplish the same goal?

The article is about the EU, I'm not sure I've heard of medallions outside the US. It's certainly not the case in the UK.

> It is seen as a part of infrastructure.

If that's the case, why aren't taxi businesses owned by the public? What makes taxi services different than water, sewer and municipal bus systems?

We have taxi services monopolizing entire markets just like ISPs (http://dailysignal.com/2016/10/19/taxi-monopolies-hurt-oppor...). These "Technically public but actually privately owned" business model appears to be the worst solution for any sort of consumer of these services.

It's the American solution, however.

At least in my town (Munich) running busses from technical POV is done by private companies, following schedules setup by the city. The question there is who does the investment and what happens the bus after a few years.

For taxi private operators can make a business by offering additional services over the mandated taxi business (chauffeur services, longer term scheduled pickups, rides between municipalities, ...) The full picture is complex, though ...

Yeah, it's definitely more complex than I'm making it out to be, there will always be "boutique" offerings on the fringes of public markets, but if 90% of people need a service to be productive in the community, the answer should be to take it off the market.

I recently spoke with an elderly woman in San Francisco on exactly this subject. She regarded Uber as the best thing that's happened to her life in the past decade. It enables her mobility in ways that taxis never did.

This is hard to argue. For one since American perspective is different from my German/Europe and that's an individual, not a larger perspective on society.

The key difference, I think, is that in your background taxis are an affordable and reliable source of transportation services for all. They provide peak and off-peak services, for routes lucrative and otherwise.

The American experience I have had with taxis is that taxis are expensive, unreliable, and will try to ditch you if they deem your destination insufficiently lucrative. When you need them most, there's a very good chance that they won't show in a reasonable timeframe... or show at all. Which is to say that they avoid providing as many of the society-level benefits you describe as possible.

San Francisco in particular was a hell of useless taxis. For a long time, calling dispatch to get a taxi left you with odds of under 50% of one actually showing up.

From my visits to the U.S. I understand some if the disfunctionalities of U.S. taxi systems, similar to most other U.S. infrastructure, while not having deeper insights. This ruling is by an European court about European markets, though.

The reasons taxi licenses were used is because governments heavily regulated price. Those sorts of price controls distort or destroy the natural market.

> Demand meets need naturally. That’s how all other businesses works.

Does this hold when the cost per mile/kilometer is still the same?

There's this thing called externalities and it's foolish to ignore them.

The market will eventually adjust and demand will come to match supply. That the "market will be flooded" is a terrible argument to justify passing anti-competitive regulations that are bad for consumers and the economy.

Hence my call for stringent regulations (working hours, insurance, emission limits, minimum price for fares maybe). This way you prevent a complete race to the bottom while still letting competition do its thing. I'm annoyed that nowadays everything is polarized between basically full communism or laissez-faire ultra liberalism (not talking about your comment specifically, just in general). We seem to have forgotten about compromises.

Sweden is a country with a deregulated taxi industry. The only regulation remaining is a requirement of a commercial taxi driving license (which is an only slightly more rigorous test), and consumer protections such as requiring an approved taximeter installed and having pricing comparison information posted in the window in a standardized format.

The Swedish taxi market is not flooded, prices are not dumped, there aren't traffic jams. The major complaints are about tourists getting scammed by overpriced taxis (where the prices are legitimately posted in the window as super expensive) since they aren't prepared to have to compare pricing between taxis since everywhere else prices are regulated.

Sweden has about 9 million of inhabitants in the whole country...

> competed on unfair terms

Albeit the taxi companies created the unfair terms. Obviously it is not necessary to have a medallion to drive someone around. HN is generally anti-lobbying to protect corporate interest, but now that Uber is big there is some regret...

> I would love for the taxi industry to be liberalised but just not for the benefit of a few Silicon Valley billionaires

And the consumer...

I’d say the major dip in drunk drivers has benefited humanity at large.

That's one hell of a post hoc justification to justify the unethical and illegal behavior of the 1% to capture even more of the economic pie.

It is backed up by evidence, though[0]. I think it was meant to validate that the model of ride sharing isn't morally bankrupt merely because it is owned by venture capitalists.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/07/business/uber-drunk-drivi...

Ride sharing isn't morally bankrupt when properly delivered and regulated. Uber is morally bankrupt, regardless of the positive impacts they've had.

There are some holes that are simply too deep to be dug out of.

Probably. It is a very interesting case study in corporate culture and corporate viability. Unless the culture changes, it seems difficult to believe that they can stay operational. it is also interesting to watch something with that much inertia slowing down by inches.

The wheels of justice and government turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine.

> post hoc justification

I don't think it matters that the justification is after the fact. I think you could actually predict a decrease in drunk driving with better access to transportation that Uber provides before the fact.

> capture even more of the economic pie

I think Uber expands the economic pie more than it takes a share of it. And once there are self-driving cars, services like Uber will become a commodity because there are no network effects on the driver side. Any company with a billion dollars will be able to create a sufficient scale of self-driving cars in a city to compete with the rest of the self-driving car services. The rich people capturing the value will be the ones who own the technology to navigate the car.

Why shouldn't people who develop a new product that solves a real problem and is in high demand not capture more of the economic pie? Seems to me they should be rewarded.

Has it caused a major dip in drunk drivers in the EU, though? Drunk driving has seemed comparably rare here, v. the US, for a long time.

> Obviously it is not necessary to have a medallion to drive someone around.

It is when that's the law..

The fact that these people have been able to profit with high visibility and applause when basically the source of their advantage is breaking the law is mind boggling.

Are taxi regulations ridiculous? yes. But that doesn't mean that rampant illegal behaviour is the answer.

>Albeit the taxi companies created the unfair terms. Obviously it is not necessary to have a medallion to drive someone around. HN is generally anti-lobbying to protect corporate interest, but now that Uber is big there is some regret...

This myth of the taxi companies lobbying to avoid competition doesn't seem based in reality. Taxis didn't seek out regulation to protect themselves. Cities began regulating fares, service areas, and the business model. Cities put rules on them for the public good. The medallion is there is to balance out the price regulations placed on taxi companies and to ensure that the rules didn't make the taxi business unprofitable.

I've never seen any indication they sought out these regulations.

Really it smells like a smear campaign to make a bunch of immigrants driving cars 12 hours a day the bad guys and to make the 60 billion dollar corporate titan the underdog.

Immigrants driving cars 12 hours a day werent the ones making money off medallions. Rich investors bought medallions as very lucrative investments, until Uber came along.

The OP seems to be oblivious to the fact that most drivers rent or lease medallions and don't own them.

They didn't seek out the regulations, but they're definitely lobbying against the competition now. As early as 2014 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/07/31/the-t...) and specifically in Europe they merged taxi unions to form a united lobbying front a few days ago (https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/ezpqne/european-t...).

And who can blame them, really. When it costs thousands of dollars to get a medallion, you want to protect your investment and do whatever you can to maximize your profits.

> And who can blame them, really. When it costs thousands of dollars to get a medallion, you want to protect your investment and do whatever you can to maximize your profits.

AFAIK, in most places in Europe a taxi license costs tens or hundreds of dollars, not thousands. (There are exceptions, of course, most famously London where the cost is more in time than in direct money, and Paris where licenses are sold second-hand for hundreds of thousands.)

A NY Medallion was going for over a million before Uber came along (now ~$850k). Wait lists are typically longer than 10 years.

OK, but the article is about Europe. So European prices are relevant, not New York prices.

It’s not just the cost of the license. In the US, and presumably in Europe, taxi rates are set by the government. Taxis can’t use things like surge pricing to maximize revenues.

Well, when a city forces you to buy a license and then lets everyone else compete for free, they are rightfully pissed.

The solution is governments reimbursing the licenses and just letting everyone do whatever they want.

I don't blame them for wanting the government to hold up their end of the bargain. That doesn't make the taxi companies the bad guys.

Shit in cities that allow Uber, if you drive a taxi without a license you STILL get fined.

> Cities began regulating fares, service areas, and the business model. Cities put rules on them for the public good.

The popularity of Uber, Lyft and similar show those two statements are in contradiction. I'm sure they weren't aware at the time, but that's what happens when you regulate business models. The status quo is locked in, and things are worse than they could be with perfect invisibility.

I don't really think the taxis should be regulated. But the popularity of Uber and Lyft is likely caused by the app flagging and pay features.

The regulations they flout, like surging pricing, aren't very popular.

And Uber is still subsidizing rides with VC money.

It wasn't the need for people to take taxis where the regulation stemmed from. It was because cities didn't want their streets to be overly congested by private vehicles (where at least in manhattan, uber has made far worse).

Taxi regulations date to a time when governments thought it was a good idea for the government to regulate rates. The government decided how much you could charge and your pricing policies, and in return, it limited competition.

My impression is that the rate regulation is to protect consumers from being ripped off or exploited. Does anyone know the actual history?

Some history of the Haas Act here: https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2013/0.... One thing to note is that this didn't happen in a vacuum. This was happening at a time when the government regulated things in ways it wouldn't dream of doing today. If you wanted to build a new telephone line, operate a new freight trucking or airline route, or build a new railway, you'd have to ask a government agency for permission, and also get approval for the prices you wanted to charge. The agency would decide "oh, there is no need for a route from here to there" and could deny permission on that basis, or decide "oh, this price is too high, you can't charge that much."

The government back then generally viewed competition as a pernicious thing. So they imposed entry requirements to limit competition. That necessitated also bringing prices under government control, to curb monopoly abuses. The Haas Act followed the same basic logic. Limit pernicious competition by limiting licenses, but curb potential abuses by controlling rates.

> This myth of the taxi companies lobbying to avoid competition doesn't seem based in reality.

There were protests by taxi/cab drivers in Budapest (no medallion system) organized by the Taxi Drivers Association.

And Uber was banned, because it lacked a telephone dispatcher center and/or whatever.

There was and is still heavy lobbying.

Uber is not a saint, far from it, but it's not like there was/is no problem with taxi/cab markets.

>Really it smells like a smear campaign to make a bunch of immigrants driving cars 12 hours a day the bad guys and to make the 60 billion dollar corporate titan the underdog.

The taxi industry has been running its own smear campaign for the last 50 years by offering completely terrible service in the majority of the US.

From the consumer perspective, Uber/Lyft are the only real options for reliable taxi service outside of a few really dense urban areas. The status quo before was calling a number, hoping they didn't hang up or scoff at the route, waiting 20-120 minutes, getting scammed by taking an inefficient route, and then getting lied to about the credit card machine not working. Oh, and then your only recourse being a report to a local taxi authority which is completely unreasonable if you are traveling due to the time effort involved.

That status quo was the thing that made Lyft/Uber an instant winner in the USA. It often gets lost amid the noise of Uber breaking the law.

The pre-rideshare world was awful and full of ripoffs. Disrupting that is the win for all.

I remember the last time I had to use a taxi. It was in Saint Louis - there was no Uber/Lyft at that time at that location. They had no website. So I had to call somewhere - cell service was nearly non-existent for some reason. My flight left in 3 hours. The taxi dispatcher sent someone, but, well, I called the dispatcher after 30 minutes. He's on his way. Great. An hour and 45 minutes before my flight, the guy pulls up. Of course he got lost or something, I don't care. We make our way to the airport. Happily, this time the credit card worked.

A few years before that, I was in Boston. Taxi had a TV playing in the headrest in front of me. Of course it was charging me, but it didn't say that. The driver didn't have a credit card reader - until I told him that I had no cash, so he had to figure it out. Then the reader came out. I asked for a receipt (business trip), and he scribbled something on literally the back of an envelope.

I will never cry about that industry being eaten.

In New York the medallion system was introduced when the supply of taxis exceeded demand. Medallions were a way to control supply and artificially inflate fares, which were also regulated. Unfortunately the supply of medallions has not kept pace with demand which caused medallion prices to skyrocket from ~$3000 ($50k in 2017 money) at their introduction to over one million dollars in the mid 2000s.

Market forces clearly aren't dictating the number of medallions, it's political. Given that fares are still regulated, there's no benefit to creating a shortage of taxis other than inflating the price of medallions. Who benefits from the inflated cost of medallions and who rents them out to taxi drivers?

Don't tell me it isn't lobbying or bribery.

> In New York the medallion system was introduced when the supply of taxis exceeded demand. Medallions were a way to control supply ...

Regulating supply is about more than fares. Traffic is an externality for the taxi/rideshare company, a 'tragedy of the commons'. I've been in cities where traffic has become much worse due to the large, unregulated influx of rideshare drivers; the cities should auction off slots - which is what medallions are (AFAIK).

Medallions can be used in a number of ways. My comment was pointing out that why they were introduced initially was not to create a commodities market.

Like I said, Medallions are there to control supply to ensure profitability of taxi drivers. Sounds like bribery? Well not if the government is dictating your price and business model.

The government says "you can't charge 10 bucks a mile when it is raining during rush hour." And note, that is exactly what Uber does when it is raining.

Limiting competition is the compromise for limiting their profitability. The government is ensuring they'll profit, but not too much. It was a common method of regulation in the past.

The problem you're ignoring is that demand vastly outpaces supply which is why the cost of medallions is so inflated. Additional medallions could be sold by the city to increase supply without affecting existing cab utilization or profits but that doesn't happen. Why? Well because the medallion owners rent their medallions out and if the supply of medallions increases then the demand and thus rent paid for medallions go down.

In pre-Uber San Francisco, many of the drivers who had medallions made a decent living renting them out to the likes of Yellow Cab instead of driving themselves. This alone shows the wrongness of that system, at least as it was done in SF. (Not sure what the system is now, but probably similar.)

I never blamed the drivers (nor the non-drivers) as it wasn't them who rigged the system. And most were pretty cool, even in the days when getting one to show up was a real challenge. (For SF folks: I would regularly wait 45 minutes for a cab to 5th and Howard in 2000, and knew better than to call Yellow which would just not show up half the time. Veteran's at least showed up eventually.)

Now that we have Uber and Lift clogging the city I would have expected the taxis to push things like customer service and professionalism... but last time I was there a taxi driver in front of my business hotel refused to take me to my doctor's office because: "You can walk that."

So I guess I'm prioritizing Lyft next time out. </anecdotal>

It's the same in NYC and Boston. If you can afford a medallion you have enough money to not be a taxi driver.

Honestly, I'm not convinced Uber's fast-and-loose approach is a bad thing. We view disruption as a good thing when it ousts an exploitative private entity -- why is it any different for the government?

> private entity > why is it any different for the government?

For the record, I don't think the medallion system is good or right or fair - it's not. Just pointing out that there are distinctions here and willfully ignoring them would be foolish.

I'm not sure I understand your post -- I'm asking why people view Uber as evil for trying to disrupt industries that are protected by the government but not when a company tries to disrupt private industry.

It is because of the idea that the government is here for public good, because they're not self-interested, whereas private industries are there because of their greed and self-interest, and they harm their customers whenever they can. In reality, nobody would eat at a government-run restaurant when they have an option to eat at private ones, and nobody would buy a government-designed cell phone when they can buy Android/iPhone. Yet government regulation of transportation, healthcare, and education is the right thing, because they are so much less important than our dinners and phones, and we can afford bureaucratic inefficiencies in these industries, right?

> I'm asking why people view Uber as evil for trying to disrupt industries that are protected by the government

That's not why people see Uber as evil. It's because they see Uber as brazenly disregarding the laws of their communities, treating their employees badly (including drivers), exploiting people who need rides in bad weather, and competing unfairly.

The Netherlands tried the experiment to, from one day to another, just remove almost all requirements to operate a taxi. Basically, the only requirements were that you had to have a vehicle that passes inspection, a valid drivers license, and register with the city government that you operate a taxi.

In Amsterdam, the result was absolute chaos. Ignoring for the moment the unhappy existing taxi drivers and companies (that was complete mess, way beyond what the police were able to control), many new entrants behaved less than professional. I.e., competing aggressively for the lucrative rides, being poorly equipped to actually deliver a taxi services.

The situation got so bad, that the old taxi company that everybody hated, was now suddenly was the most reliable taxi service.

The question then becomes how you view the taxi market. Is it a market where anything goes. Where sometimes, in the middle of the night, there is just no taxi that wants to take you (home) for a price you can afford. Where taxi drivers claim that tourists agreed to pay an insane amount of money per person for a short ride from the airport to a nearby hotel.

Or do you want something that is mostly predictable. Maybe not very efficient, certainly not nice. But with reasonable expectation that if you order a taxi, one will show up and take you where you need to go?

Or maybe you can get good parts from both approaches?

Would you describe the present environment as chaotic? Rideshare companies have solved the problems you describe.

You can debate whether it’s fair that they’ve profited by breaking the rules. But they’ve made a very compelling case that the rules aren’t needed anymore.

So what was the problem? No price transparency for the customers at the airport, no vetting of the drivers, and no reputation market for the drivers.

All of these are/could be/would have been solved by mandating the use of an app. The City of Amsterdam should have made an app, drivers register, that keeps track of their fares and manages supply-demand surges.

Economically it's a race to the bottom unless there's a constrained supply. Especially when [not if] self driving cars start operating as taxis.

If Amsterdam wants to treat taxis as a public good (to get reliable night transport for example), then it can regulate it as such, pay some money for drivers (or otherwise compensate them) to be available at night if natural demand is (or would be) too low.

Just out of curiosity, what were the requirements that got lifted?

I would hope it's a race to the bottom when taxis are self driving. Why keep prices needlessly higher than the base material cost in that csse?

A race to the bottom means cutting quality (e.g., cleaning frequency and thoroughness) to reach the lowest price.

So long as there's multiple providers, if one of them gives a filthier, though cheaper, service, there's definitely people who will prefer it.

Economically no problem with that race, of course it eventually means cutting out the human driver and usually people who can only drive are not really ready to get a different job. They have no other skills that are "in demand".

The problem is that the Dutch government bought the whole 'free market will solves every problem' ideology. So obviously, a city government was not allowed to mandate anything in this context.

Public transport is the public good that the government pays (in part) for. I doubt that you can randomly pay taxis to be available at night. Then you have to figure out a scheme who gets paid and who doesn't. Otherwise, you may find lots of people who want to get paid for doing nothing at night.

I don't know the details of the old taxi system. There were a limited number of licenses. There was a limit on how much a taxi could charge. But probably there were lots of other requirements as well.

>And the consumer...

Sorry, but as a consumer I welcome this. I will gladly pay a few bucks more or wait five minutes more for a taxi than having every industry taken over by the absentee landlord class that is the tech industry. In the case of Uber spying on their employees, having no obligations any other employer has, paying no taxes and misusing the data of their customers and drivers.

From time to time people would do well do understand that everybody is not just consumer but also a worker, or in the end you'll end up in a bad spot yourself.

One just needs to look at the fact that these businesses have customers and drivers rate each other, which is nothing but undignified and gamified surveillance. Don't give up essential freedoms for the sake of convenience.

I feel the same. If only I could hail a taxi with an app instead of having to stand in the street and wave like an idiot at drivers that have riders but who have neglected to turn off their light (as they all do in my city.) And if only when I have to call for a cab I could give them my GPS location so they don't get lost and never show up and if I could provide my destination so they don't take the long way, either on purpose or accidentally. And if only there was a way to see that the cab was actually en route to my location and see an ETA.

If the cab industry could develop an app that works like Uber/Lyft I think they'd be competitive again. I use cabs when they're right there and I know the city, otherwise I reluctantly use Lyft or whatever's available.

Not sure what city you live in, but the ad on the top of the cab is not "the light". I can't imagine a fare system that is not hooked directly to the actual "driver is available for a fare" light, i.e., once the fare is underway, the light switches off. Also, there are apps now in several cities to hail cabs, and some cab companies have their own apps (kind of like Uber, i.e., you can't hail a Lyft or Via via Uber, so why should there be a universal app to hail any cab -- but that would depend on your city and how cabs operate).

Yes, I've tried the one app that I've seen available here (Boston) but it didn't work. It's been a few months, I'll try it again. Cab drivers here don't use their available light so that they can't be ticketed for not picking up minorities.

I've got an entire city of people (Vancouver, BC) who are desperately waiting for Uber to come and save us from the ridiculous taxi situation in this city. Five more minutes? You're lucky. If you can get an Taxi in 2 hours downtown this month, you're lucky. If you can get a cab to drive you to a suburb, good luck. And we have plenty of people interested in driving for Uber when it comes here.

I welcome as much regulation as necessary to ensure that Uber is safe for consumers but beyond that I say let the tech industry come.

As someone who recently visited Vancouver I was pretty shocked by this.

No Uber and barely any taxis. I must've seen 4 taxis in the 10 days I was there. What's with this?

We have a medallion system and those medallions cost a lot of money. The taxi lobby keeps the number of medallions issued low to protect their investment. In addition, there are a number of stupid regulations and artificial boundaries that make the situation worse for everyone.

Unfortunately the government has created a situation where they've made owning a taxi medallion a huge investment and simply allowing Uber would destroy that investment overnight. The taxi industry, knowing now that they're at the mercy of the government, have started "donating" much more aggressively. At this point, the government is just trying to avoid dealing with the issue for as long as possible.

How hard is it for a tech startup to recreate an uber-like dispatching solution for these taxi companies that ostensibly have deep pockets?

The taxi companies here in Vancouver did that themselves (ostensibly to show they weren't behind technologically in contrast with Uber). However, that in itself doesn't solve any problems. If you can't get a cab by calling dispatch, you can't get a cab using an app.

The incumbent taxi industry is way worse than you describe. Prices aren’t five bucks more, they’re often 2X, with worse drivers due to the lack of a passenger feedback loop. Not to mention that a substantial portion of those profits getting sucked up by the medallion holders, who are much more absentee landlords than Uber or Lyft.

I talked once to someone who honestly thought medallion fees went to pay for driver health insurance and benefits. The status quo was just as exploitive.

In pre-Uber/Lyft San Francisco, it was literally impossible to get a cab home on a weekend night. I would call a dispatcher an hour ahead of time, and stand about a 25% chance of a taxi actually showing up. They would expect you to be waiting at the location the entire time - the drivers would not call to let you know they'd arrived.

Thanks for sharing your perspective, really needed to hear this.

I was in San Francisco, the birthplace of Uber, in 2009/2010. If you wanted a taxi pickup, you generally had to call two or three taxi companies and wait 30-45 minutes for a two in three chance of a taxi showing.

That doesn't happen anymore. Not after Uber.

Whoa, taxis showed up 2 out of 3 times for you? The official study has it at 49%:

https://archives.sfmta.com/cms/rtaxi/documents/2005TaxiAvail...

I even remember when the number was lower ...

If you called three companies and waited half an hour, odds favored at least one showing up.

But, yeah. Things were pretty miserable unless you were somewhere taxis actually wanted to be.

I don't want Uber to disappear, but they brought this ruling upon themselves. A lot of taxi regulations are stupid. However, Uber chose to ignore the reasonable ones as well with the "we aren't a taxi company excuse." If they weren't as blatant with subverting the law, I would have more sympathy towards them.

This attitude that it's terrible that some people get rich is silly at the very least -- destructive at its very worst. And in particular as to ride-sharing services. The net benefit to the consumer has been unbelievably good, and it points to a future where there are fewer personal vehicles and more vehicles for hire, which in turn will have (I think) significant benefits for traffic, city planning, etc. For example, as the number of private cars in NYC goes down, it might be possible to ban parking on more streets, thus increasing their traffic carrying capacity and alleviating traffic problems.

But no, some people got rich doing this. And monopolists got hurt (we're really going to feel sorry for them?!). What a crock. Imagine missing out on all this dynamism and sticking to a measly 13,000 taxis in Manhattan (none in the boroughs, not really) because those millionaires who own taxi fleets and multi-million dollar medallions might suffer while some people in SV make billions. The story is the same around the world.

No, I won't feel sorry for the taxi medallion owners, nor the banks that lent to them that lost money when medallion prices crashed.

Calling Uber a tax firm is akin to calling personal workout equipment a gym. Or calling a bed and breakfast a hotel. Don't get me wrong Uber should pay its fair share of taxes/fees, but bunching apples and oranges together for the sake of policy simplicity comes off as non-progressive in my view.

I don't follow your examples. How is workout-equipment:gym like uber:taxi-firm?

> non-progressive

I'm not sure what you mean by progress, exactly, but policy simplicity is progress IMHO.

Do Bed and Breakfasts usually operate under contracts with larger corporate entities that set service standards and reap a share of the profits? I'd assume most are small, family run businesses.

> Calling Uber a tax firm is akin to calling personal workout equipment a gym.

You got that exactly right. If I let people pay to use my personal workout equipment, then I'm operating a gym. Uber let's people pay to be driven around and is thus called a taxi service.

>If I let people pay to use my personal workout equipment, then I'm operating gym.

If I let people pay to use my phone, then I am operating a cellular company. If I let people pay to use my lawn mower, then I am operating a grass cutting company. etc... No logically this ruling makes no sense. Just upset taxi companies that want to maintain the status quo.

In those examples you'd be operating equipment rental companies. I'm really not sure how this fits into an analogy with Uber, whose failed rationalization is that they're just a digital service connecting customers with freelance drivers. Filling exactly the same role as a taxi company with a slightly different setup.

"Uber" doesn't own the "workout equipment". Who are they in this analogy?

Uber don't own the equipment but they do:

1. Decide who gets to use it, not you (sole and absolute discretion to accept or decline rides). You may be banned if you don't let someone use your equipment they want you to.

2. Interview and recruit you, the person who owns the gym equipment.

3. Excludes you from knowing who you're entering into a contract with.

4. You must work in exactly the way they say (they set the route, the equipment you're allowed to have,

5. You're not free to negotiate the price higher, they set it.

6. They discipline you.

7. They're in control of refunding "your" customer.

8. Used to guarantee you earnings.

9. They accept the risk of loss, not you.

10. Complaints don't go to you, they go to them.

11. They reserve the right to change any of the above unilaterally.

So basically, they're your boss but you need to bring your own equipment. It'd be like saying my work aren't really my boss if I use my own laptop.

Points taken from the case they lost trying to describe their workers as "self employed", saying Uber worked for the drivers.

https://www.judiciary.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/asla...

A lot of contractor's work in similar situations -- it seems like you're implying that the passenger is the customer but the passenger is just a package to be delivered. The customer for the driver is Uber. A lot of these are good points, though.

The key difference for many contractors in the UK is the level of control the person paying them has. A right to subcontract is a big one, which is failed with Uber. Also how I perform the work. If Uber were just paying for the package to be delivered, then they'd not care about the precise route, and the drivers could choose which people they do or don't "deliver". Uber exercise significant control over how the work they want done is done, and enough so that it falls under the definition of a "worker" (not employee though).

> The customer for the driver is Uber.

They argued they were not the customer but in fact worked for the drivers. They argued that the driver had a contract with the passenger, paragraph 91 on page 28 explains nicely how odd that seems (I'd copy & paste but it's a scanned pdf).

The precise route is actually an important part of the service provided to customers. Same with ensuring the identity of the driver.

However, I don't see how they can argue the driver has a contract with the passenger since all customer relationship is handled through Uber.

It's certainly an important part of the service Uber offers, but that's rather the point, it's a service they offer to the passenger and contract others to do the work. Then the level of control is such that it makes the drivers workers in the UK. If the control was stronger (more control of hours, equipment, etc) then they'd be employees.

>However, I don't see how they can argue the driver has a contract with the passenger since all customer relationship is handled through Uber.

I fully agree, and I think we both do (at least on this point) with the employment tribunals findings that this doesn't really describe the reality of how things work. The description I referenced is a great attack on what they argue.

"Uber was founded in 2009 as UberCab" - Wikipedia

For consumers, Lyft/Uber/etc = best things to happen in years in transportation.

Private car experience at the price of a subway ticket is great, while making car ownership optional in places with lousy public transit. Surprised you care more about people following the rules than enjoying the benefits of VC-subsidized rides :)

Maybe they just remember the same arguments made about Google, FB, etc... and worry about the future?

For the benefit of who then?

That legislation isn't going to change itself. It needs to be challenged. Kudos (from me), and money (from willing consumers, including me), go to the companies that challenge it. I see no problem with this whatsoever.

I agree. But this is the new form of economic imperialism--nobody suspects a bunch of nerdy billionaires under 40 with multi-national employee pool linked to target countries elite educational institutions...good luck telling your best and the brightest why they shouldn't take that 7 digit salary from Americans, especially when no other domestic enterprises exists or willing to absorb that many new graduates.

This is good to hear. A few weeks ago we saw the recording breaking loss, showing Uber is really undercutting everyone and operating way under costs (while slashing drivers pays and yada yada).

Uber is big, really big. But I don't think it's too big to fail. And I think a failure will be colossal.

Has anyone noticed Lyft prices have gone way up? Like, almost standard cab fair prices in some cities? I wonder if Lyft is banking on the fact a lot of people use them so they don't use Uber, and noticing their prices are just slightly less than a regular cab. They could put them in a place where they're profitable, and charge a more traditional rate.

In the early days I knew Uber drivers who use to be cab drivers who claimed they made a ton more money than with their cab company. I doubt that's as true anymore, but once Uber fails, I bet we'll see a huge re-emergence of Cabs -- possibly alternative ride sharing apps that will put more money in the hands of drivers (where it should be).

It's really weird being in American cities today, because the number of cabs is significantly lower and noticeable. I saw a woman with her hand up, actually hailing a cab, and thought that was so weird. You rarely see that now. I mean it's probably better that cabs are more efficient with apps, going directly from pickup to pickup instead of burning fuel driving around, but there is still something lost with not being able to raise you hand or go to a taxi stand and get a cab in a city.

  I don't think it's too big to fail

Please stop with this "too big to fail" nonsense. This is a pretty specific term for companies which pose a systemic risk if they fail. Notably that's mostly banks or other financial institutions who could drag an entire economy down if they go down.

There's no systemic risk in Uber failing.

I think that in this case, “too big to fail” would mean that investors would bail them out rather than let them go under.

If they believe that the company will make money in the long-run. Otherwise it's just putting bad money after good. You can only bail out a company if you believe it will become profitable. You can't subsidize rides eternally, it does not make sense for investors.

Totally agreed, and I believe that’s what the commenter meant when saying that they aren’t too big to fail.

> I don't think it's too big to fail.

My gut reaction: There's no company the size of Uber that could die more quietly. The world's reaction would be a muffled "meh".

Uber doesn't even own their most important asset, which is their drivers, and if they collapse catastrophically their drivers will simply turn off the Uber app and download one of a half dozen competitors' apps (if they don't already have it). For Uber customers, the transition will be even easier.

Maybe I'm missing something: This isn't like a car company that owns and manages factories, or like a tech company that has labs or does significant R&D, or even a bank that has lots of employees and owns other assets.

So genuine question: what do we loose if Uber vanishes tomorrow?

(Don't get me wrong, I'd be sympathetic to their employees who need to find new jobs, but my guess is that their skills are in relatively high demand.)

it could have a massive effect on tech valuations in general. so from a real economy perspective you may be right, but the stock market and VC market might start to see this as an event to re-evaluate everything.

An event they would entirely deserve, if that's the case.

And it would be a gain for the society, too - because currently it seems the more absurd a valuation is, the more there is something wrong with a company - either it's doing useless crap, antisocial crap, or behaving immorally while doing something potentially useful.

I would love to see the valuations go down, to reduce the incentives for smart people to grow harmful businesses.

"...but the stock market and VC market might start to see this as an event to re-evaluate everything"

You are saying it as it is a bad thing.

Yes exactly. The only ones who stand to lose if uber fails are the investors who put money into it. Oh boo.

And rank-and-file employees.

I hate Uber's shitty stunts as much as you do, but lets have some empathy for regular folks who work there.

Employees are paid quite handsomely. Their equity may go to trash though. Given that, that was always a gamble- It should've been factored all along.

I disagree that the regular employees are innocent here. You support the company you work for. Most employees there could easily get jobs elsewhere. Sure, they forfeit options, but they stop powering truly one of the worst companies we have seen in some time. Not to mention the sexual harassment and bad work environment, which is at least partially on rank and file employees.

I have no sympathy for well-off workers more or less choosing to work for shitty companies and supporting them in a complicit manner. We have ethical duties to work for companies that make a positive impact when we have realistic options. If there are no options and you're doing the job for reasonable comfort of life that you can't get elsewhere, different story. I don't think most employees at Uber fall into that category.

Uber employee here: Give some thought to what you'd expect to see over time if the company genuinely had changed internally. Hold Uber to it. I suspect it'll meet that bar.

Future actions do not excuse past ones. A right and a wrong don't cancel out, they both exist. I have noticed small improvements with the introduction of tipping and I'm sure it will get better, but that's not very hard to do from the starting point. Becoming not a shitty company doesn't make it any better to support anyone who possibly was a part of the old Uber. The damage is done. It's not likely the company fires everyone in the old Uber, and even if it does, the people who funded it still profit. That's not proper justice for the original actions that they still consistently avoid accountability on at all costs.

I don't want to skate over the moral grey area here because obviously improvement is better than not. But, you have to consider alternatives.

Let's rephrase the question: Why should anyone use Uber if Lyft is available and they can afford any small price difference, if any?

I think most people are concerned with making sure they're not actively supporting and organization currently behaving badly (and I pretty strongly believe that Uber isn't).

I've been at the company for 2.5 years. I'm solidly within your firing range. I've seen a company with a behavioral distribution that was slightly shifted from the societal mean. My job has almost exclusively involved interacting with people whose behavior fell within societally normal. Nevertheless, the upper tail of Uber's behavioral distribution was, retrospectively, clearly in a bad place.

I believe that that behavioral distribution has shifted to being mundane.

> I think most people are concerned with making sure they're not actively supporting and organization currently behaving badly (and I pretty strongly believe that Uber isn't)

I don't think that's morally right to only consider that. Even still, I don't see a reason not to use Lyft. They are more or less identical products at this point. One is owned by a company that used to do some pretty bad things. Why support the people that funded that and people that supported those people? Why take the risk it could ever happen again (even if you assure us it won't)? If you fall within those original parameters I set, I think there's no excuse for not using Lyft.

Yep, totally get what you're driving at here.

To the extent that you're asking about product differentiation: scale, eta, and price are reasons people choose one over the other.

To the extent that you're keen on punishing people who have behaved badly in order to disincentivize future bad behavior, good on you, that seems reasonable. I think it's hard to draw the line as to where this is actually useful/practical, and obviously it'll be a different line for different people. I'd guess that you're not boycotting every other startup that Benchmark has put early money into, for example.

Hi Uber employee, this is an unrelated question, do you have any thoughts on the recent Uber Visa card?

I have it. It's not metal :(

I'm a simple man.

I agree, not everyone has the luxury of choosing a job they believe in, and back before Uber became uncool I can see how people would sign up. That said, we're talking about a few thousand people compared to over a million drivers, and most of them are probably quite employable.

Note that in many areas within the US, the only competition to Uber is Lyft and taxi cabs.

I think you're 100% right, and there was even natural experiment confirming this when Uber (and Lyft) left Austin temporarily. Basically the city council wanted rideshare drivers to do City background checks. There was a public referendum, and Uber/Lyft said they'd leave if it passed. Then it passed, and they left. Pretty much overnight there were 3-4 Austin-centric Uber competitors. Riders and drivers just switched apps. Colloquially, people would even still say "get an Uber" while using these other apps.

Eventually this was superceded by a Texas law, and Uber/Lyft came back, but the rideshare apocalypse that was predicted never came to be because there are very few barriers to entry in this market: build a relatively simple app, paste up some fliers or billboards advertising your new company to drivers and riders, and you're in business.

Admittedly, Austin has more ambitious app coders than most other random cities, so it might not be literally overnight like it was here, but it won't take that long for somebody to do the same in the rest of the country/world. On the other hand, those places likely won't lose Lyft at the same time like Austin did, so it may be a wash.

>>what do we loose if Uber vanishes tomorrow?

VC(s) will have to write off several billion dollars worth of investment. Its will be lost permanently to never return back.

> In the early days I knew Uber drivers who use to be cab drivers who claimed they made a ton more money than with their cab company. I doubt that's as true anymore

As (one piece of anecdotal) evidence, I was talking with a guy that drives for both Uber and a local cab company. The cab company pays more, but he still prefers driving for Uber as he is put in far fewer sketchy situations by them.

Define "sketchy situations", please.

Cab driving is one of the most dangerous jobs in the US.

That's not helping. I live in Germany, and I have a friend who worked as a cab driver on the side for a year. May only be a small sample, but I didn't hear any dangerous or sketchy stories from them. But then again, that's Germany, which has (among other things) gun laws that are not a joke.

Cab drivers are frequented targets of robbery and also typically pick up people late at night and when there’s less people around to witness.

From my Uber conversations I was able to piece together that one of the sweetest benefits was that you could be paid instantly for your work, equivalent to cash in hand rather than waiting up to a month for a payslip.

The other was that 2-3 years ago one Uber driver claimed he was grossing up to £7000 a month working 16 hours a day 7 days a week.

I had a Lyft driver tell me exactly the same thing a few weeks ago. They drove for both Lyft and Uber as well as a more conventional taxi job of some sort. And they specifically called out the paid instantly as a big advantage for Uber/Lyft.

Yea I had uber driver tell me he cleared 100k maybe 3 or 4 years ago. Back then uber only took a 15% i think. They also paid crazy incentives to lure drives. Like earn 1-2k for x amount of rides in a certain period. Now that they have a sufficient amount of drivers they drastically cut the incentives. Google the protests in India by their drivers after incentive pay was cut. I think most drivers were making more from incentives than fares.

[Disclaimer: Uber employee]

Unfortunately for your argument, if there is one thing to deduce from Uber's year of hell, it's that Uber's not going anywhere. I could list around 50 groundbreaking events this year, each of which in itself could have taken a relatively young company like Uber down. Instead, Uber GREW 17% in ONE quarter let alone slow down - http://www.businessinsider.com/ubers-losses-grow-in-q3-but-b...

You could attribute this growth to artificially reduced prices but that's incorrect. The price reduction comes from competition with other ride-sharing (Ola, Lyft, Grab etc) over an ever-increasing pie, not against existing taxi options. This is evident from mature markets like New York where prices are stable and yet growth is strong.

Hence, outside the realms of people wanting to protect existing taxi options + users turned off from Uber's scandals, Uber isn't too big to fail due to government or VC protections but it's simply too valuable to far too many users for it to fail. These users include:

1. For drivers that fall in the full-time category, it's significantly better than old taxi options that forced expensive medallions, fees for the privilege of working that causes them to not even break-even on days, and ultra-long shifts. It's sad to see my fellow HN'ers yearning for such a regressive and exploitative cartel-driven taxi system. For more context, read https://priceonomics.com/post/47636506327/the-tyranny-of-the... before romanticizing an old system out of spite for a large tech company.

2. For part-time drivers, it provides opportunities that simply did not exist before. Earning $x dollars an hour during idle time is such a powerful force that it can alleviate macro-level recessionary pains. See https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/business/2017-12-03....

3. For users, it's essentially a daily-used verb at this point.

It's unfortunate and sad that this value add is overshadowed by a never ending list of scandals but Uber is planning on owning up and creating positive change going forward. I wouldn't be there if it were not the case. Best I can do for now is help HN understand the value Uber provides and the company changes will slowly and surely fall into place.

I dont overly care what regulatory framework we place Uber into, I care that they dont misclassify their workers as independent contractors. The whole gig "economy" is a scam, people smarter than I have broken down the numbers about the cost of maintaining your vehicle (in uber's sake) and the tax bill due in april exceeding the pay. Not to mention theres little to no job security or benefits. Pay Your Workers.

You can get vastly different analysis results depending on the assumptions you make about the marginal cost to run a vehicle - If someone is leasing a high end SUV they wouldn't otherwise need the pay is far worse than if someone is driving around in a 5 year old car they already needed. It also makes a huge difference if they are doing this as a full time job or only during peak times.

And all of these factors are in the driver's control, rather than Uber's.

What's worse, Uber's interests and and "independent contractors" interests are not fully aligned. When Uber wins, there's plenty of drivers on the street and no surge pricing. When drivers win, it's surge pricing all day long. This adversarial relationship is inevitably going to produce bad results for the drivers, who are undoubtedly the weaker party.

Can you clarify what exactly you think is a "scam"? People are free to drop in or out of the 'gig economy' at their discretion. For things like Uber there are services available to rent cars with time frames as low as by the hour, to help drivers determine if the wages and work are what they're really looking for. At worst, they could simply chat with another driver for the service.

You should care. Uber has lobbied in my state to not be classified as a taxi (or common carrier), and their drivers are classified as independent contractors. They were able to successfully lobby for this classification by guaranteeing a $1,000,000 liability insurance policy for injury caused by their drivers.

If your injuries due to driver negligence exceed this amount (which is very possible if you are severely injured and become disabled for the rest of your life, unable to work), you have no recourse. You cannot currently go after Uber because they are not classified as a common carrier. You are screwed.

Taxi drivers are usually independent contractors.

[The] ECJ said that a service whose purpose was "to connect, by means of a smartphone application and for remuneration, non-professional drivers using their own vehicle with persons who wish to make urban journeys" must be classified as "a service in the field of transport" in EU law.

It added: "As EU law currently stands, it is for the member states to regulate the conditions under which such services are to be provided in conformity with the general rules of the treaty on the functioning of the EU."

It didn't say it was a cab firm, but it did say it's a transport service, not a "digital service". To me as a layman, that makes perfect sense. With all kinds of services being improved using digital technology, the term "digital service" can be applied to almost anything.

In countries like Morocco, Egypt, China etc EVERYONE is a taxi driver. Stick your finger up and they'll drive you a few km/miles for a few bucks.

Uber incorporated / centralised that. It's not some vague digital enabler marketplace. They know the route, micromanage both the driver and passenger, collect money based on route, unilaterally set prices. How someone can think they're not a taxi company is beyond me.

This. If this wasn't the case I would not have been able to get off from one of the mountains after dark a few years ago.

You can probably hitchhike from a mountain in Europe, as most mountains are in remote or fairly remote areas.

Court press release

https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/201...

The full ruling is atm only available in spanish and french

http://curia.europa.eu/juris/documents.jsf?num=C-434/15

At this moment, I count the full ruling in 18 languages, including English, though that version is marked "Provisional text". Possibly working direct link: http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&doc...

Wow. Uber single handedly made folks on ycombinator pro cab industry. The hatred I saw for the cab industry when Uber was announced or becoming successful was so strong that I am amazed at how grandly Uber fucked it up.

Practically though, Uber is still doing great and probably will be just fine even after this ruling. The traditional taxis are still bad and have never reinvented themselves.

that doesn't make sense.

HN is pro Lyft but also pro cab?

I just think HN doesn't like Uber

Please don't do this. HN is a diverse community, and you choose to be a part of it. Casting all of HN in one bucket does a disservice to everyone.

It seems that the fallacy of characterizing a large community (e.g. reddit, HN) as a single entity capable of things like hypocrisy is becoming more and more commonplace.

you're missing the point. I'm not saying every single HN hates Uber.

But there's very common pattern of disliking Uber on HN.

note i didn't say the hate against Uber was underserved.

And again: "Taxi company considered by a court to be a taxi company". And this is news.

And no, dear US, "taxi" does not mean "ride service that has a monopoly on picking up people on the street, enforced by the use of medallions or similar". Taxi means "A car that takes you somewhere without a preplanned route, for money". This is why this is so bloody obvious.

In any place without a mediallion system or other enforced monopoly, there is NO innovation in what Uber is doing! An app or surge pricing is what everyone does. Ubers sole innovation is pretending that they aren't a taxi company so they don't need to hire and pay their employees properly. And honestly we can do without that innovation.

That's not what taxi means unless you consider all ride services such as black cars taxis -- which I don't think anyone does.

Also taxis don't hire people, people rent taxis and then drive them.

Uber's argument is that they're more like a limo service in the sense that you call and book a driver. But you do this with Taxis too. It's just in most cities, taxis can also take immediate bookings on the street or from a taxi stand.

Technology really blurs the line, and for most purposes, they act and fulfill the market that is provided by Taxis.

That's not what they argued. The ECJ ruling is that the Uber is a company providing "‘a service in the field of transport’ within the meaning of EU law."

Uber claimed they weren't. They were claiming to be just an infrastructure service without any influence over the transportation part of the business. They wanted to do this since transportation services are subject to the local regulations as a specific exception to the normal Single Market rules on the provision of services (where you only required to follow your home regulations).

P.S. Your home regulations will include all the common European regulations but customer local regulations could be different.

Well, if we're nit-picking the ruling made was simply that Uber must be considered 'a service in the field of transport', not a taxi specifically. I think it would be hard for anyone who wasn't an Uber lawyer to deny that one.

Agreed, they are definitely 'a service in the field of transport'

> That's not what taxi means unless you consider all ride services such as black cars taxis -- which I don't think anyone does.

No that's what I mean. You can put a label on then depending on local regulations for monopolies which is why in some cities there are lots of silly distinctions such as cab/minicab/"black car" or whatever.

But all those distinctions have just appeared because of the local monopoly - not becasuse they are inherently differnent. From an insurance/employment/etc. standpoint they are "cars that take people from a to b for money" - and whether you call that "cab firm" or call it "ride service" or something else is irrelevant.

> Also taxis don't hire people, people rent taxis and then drive them.

Again - this is a local phenomenon. There are places where cab firms are one man businesses, co-ops, owned cars/rented cars etc. It doesn't really matter either.

Using the UK, as an example, there are two very distinct types of taxis:

1. Those hailed on the street or found waiting at a taxi stand/rank. These are metered services. They drive you somewhere and you pay the amount shown on the meter. In London, and some other parts of the UK, these are known as Black Cabs (because the vehicles have traditionally been painted black).

2. Pre-booked services. Essentially a passenger phones to make a booking, informs the service of the pick-up address and destination, agrees a price, then waits for the taxi to arrive. These are known as Mini Cabs.

Both these services are licensed and regulated in the UK.

Uber very clearly falls into the second category. They're just a Mini Cab firm with a fancy app.

So the term "Mini Cabs" are a result of confusing arising from weird local regulations in UK cities. The same as people think its normal that in NYC you can get a "Black car" which is different from a (Yellow) taxi.

But again: all these terms are just effects of the madness that is a local monopoly on one type of ride service (typically, but not always, the one that can use taxi stands and be hailed without pre booking on the street).

This has made people associate "taxi" or "cab" with just that one type of ride service, in their city. Which is understandable - but it makes no sense when discussing laws across a continent, or worldwide. "Taxi" has a very simple definition: it's a vehicle for hire with a driver. An Uber is a taxi service even if it's not (yet) allowed to perform the same services as a yellow cab in new york, or a london taxi

> Also taxis don't hire people, people rent taxis and then drive them.

Over here they very much do hire people, taxi drivers are normal employees. The same company is also contracted for temporary work by the local bus company and by the municipality for bringing disabled kids to schools, that sort of thing; it's all the same drivers.

Things are not the same everywhere.

> And again: "Taxi company considered by a court to be a taxi company". And this is news.

Any info on how much it cost European citizens to establish this stunning revelation?

I think you've fundamentally misunderstood how courts and civil justice works.

> An app or surge pricing is what everyone does.

In 2017, yes. But despite the fact that in some countries, Uber clones appeared before Uber did, Uber was, as far as I remember, the first to implement such a model.

And everyone who remembers ordering a taxi in advance and waiting for 20-30 minutes for a bad, rude driver, for 2-3 the money that taxis cost now, can appreciate the innovation.

> And everyone who remembers ordering a taxi in advance and waiting for 20-30 minutes for a bad, rude driver, for 2-3 the money that taxis cost now, can appreciate the innovation.

A cab company with a rating system?

> And everyone who remembers ordering a taxi in advance and waiting for 20-30 minutes for a bad, rude driver, for 2-3 the money that taxis cost now, can appreciate the innovation.

I think what people are confusing here are the effects of a removed monopoly and technical innovation.

The solution isn't removing employment safety, the solution is just removing the monopoly in cities where there are taxi monopolies. All Uber did was simply circumvent the monopoly regulations.

Try a non-uber taxi in a city without taxi monopoly and it's exactly like uber.

> Try a non-uber taxi in a city without taxi monopoly and it's exactly like uber.

I feel like I'm repeating myself - yes, it is, in 2017.

In 2007 it was nothing like it. It became like it after people started cloning Uber.

Did cities with monopolies start dropping the monopolies in the last decade? I lived in a city that dropped the monopoly before Uber so I haven't noticed the change in the last decade.

I may need you to provide the definition of innovation. Uber enables me to call a cab even before I leave the building, it suggests a price for me, it shows me cab's location, it sends my request to more than one cab.

That's how a taxi works, yes.

The only potentially new thing here (though not necessary invented by Uber) was "shows me cab's location", but the remaining three? All of them were supported since people invented telephones and portable radio transmitters.

Uber's primary innovation is, and always has been, their operations playbook, which allowed - and still allows - them to grow a billion-dollar business while routinely breaking the laws in front of everybody and not even trying to hide it much.

But I have no interest in talking to anyone or have essays worth of conversations where to meet and at what time and for what price. Or, like for instance a London competition app and many cab services outside London demand; to book n (even 24 for some) hours in advance.

> I may need you to provide the definition of innovation. Uber enables me to call a cab even before I leave the building, it suggests a price for me, it shows me cab's location, it sends my request to more than one cab.

If there are regulations that would prevent taxi companies from doing that, then that's the problem.

If there is a monopoly so they don't have incentive to do that then that's a problem.

I can use an app to pre-book, pre-pay and track a taxi using any of the local taxi companies (of which none has a monopoly). The problem is solvable...

Not to mention not mess around with cards or cash. No cash is a distant dream for me using non Uber rides. Innovation I do not know but all things you mention work conveniently well in Uber and badly or not at all in most half baked attempts by (for instance the city of Barcelona) taxi service apps.

I think where innovation is poor it's typically because there is a monopoly that simply removes incentives of operators to innovate, and a lack of good regulation, such as what the service must provide (payment options, safety, insurance, apps, ...).

If the regulation says "there can only be one company and they can charge cash only if they want" then the regulation is poor. The regulation should say "Anyone who fulfills the criteria on safety/insurance/skill can operate a taxi business. And oh, they must accept credit cards".

That's exactly what taxi companies in germany do as well. myTaxi.com being one provider of such services, for example.

So in comparison, suddenly the only advantage uber has left is being unregulated.

Well, for what it's worth, Uber was founded in March 2009, while MyTaxi was founded in June 2009.

AFAIR Uber didn't start with taking over the regular taxi market with shiny apps and illegal behaviour; that only came later.

My local taxi place does all of this too, and has done for a few years.

It's like saying Apple Map does the same thing Google Maps does. I don't think it's a good argument if you try to convince me Uber is not innovative.

My point is Uber did not invent them. This was happening before Uber existed.

I have been using taxis a lot -- even as primary city transport service. Early 2000: pretty much I used to go to work and back by taxi.

I could call, they'd know the calling phone location (land lines, so that was fixed). Alternatively I'd have to tell where I was and where I'd like to go to. Either they would tell how much time it'd take, plus the car number picking me... or call back with the same info, if no immediate taxi was available.

The meters were a must - both distance and time and you got a receipt at the end. That's like 17-18y ago.

Exactly, people conflate "taxi medallions" with "special driver licenses for transporting people for money", and I think Uber is encouraging this confusion. I would happily get rid of the first, which gives established taxi drivers a quasi-monopoly - or at least change how limited taxi rights are distributed, if you find they are necessary. I am very glad that the special driving licenses exist, though.

In Germany for example, we have both requirements. But for years there have (legally) been companies who don't have "taxi rights", and label themselves as "rental cars with driver". They are cheaper than regular taxis, but they are not allowed to park in taxi spots, and you can't hire them from the roadside I think. But the drivers still have to pass the same tests as regular taxi drivers (health tests, background tests, knowledge of the city, ...). I think this is a really good model, it gives the customer a cheaper option if they are a bit more flexible with their pick-up spots.

Uber should do exactly this, but instead they want to skirt the person transport license requirements and hire "untrained" drives. They purposely mix the issues of licenses and medallions, hoping to use people's hate of monopolies and high taxi prices to steer public opinion in their direction.

Also, Uber sometimes claims to be a ride-sharing service. Just private citizens who share their car and get compensated, not professionals. Well, every Uber I have been in, anywhere in the world, was very professional. You can't tell me this is just their side hobby. And if they really wanted to offer just ride-sharing, this exists legally in Germany as well. People can connect on car-sharing websites with strangers, and pay the driver their share of the expenses. It's a popular way to cheaply get around. And if the driver only does it for compensation, not as a job, no license is required.

The arguments against special taxi licences are the same arguments against occupational licensing in general.

Do you want every entry level job to require a license and put up barriers to getting these jobs for immigrants? Do you think nail technicians, hairdressers and waiters should require a license to do their job too?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupational_licensing

Some jobs should require licenses, or better: exams, some shouldn't. I see no problem deciding that on a case-by-case basis. And as long as the test is not too expensive to take, why not have a hairdresser exam?

The thing that is a barrier for immigrants, in most places, is that they don't get work permits.

Totally agree and I love innovation and shaking up the establishment.

But Uber's story is full lies, deception, sexism, corruption, theft, etc, etc, etc...

It's like how Apple managed to pass off Apple Pay as a huge innovation because the US has such outdated payment processing infrastructure. When I go to the states chip & pin is still considered exotic - I'm signing a receipt about 50% of the time. Meanwhile Canada has had "tap to pay" credit cards since at least 2009 [1].

[1] https://www.itbusiness.ca/news/contactless-payments-set-to-t...

Apple pay is more about the credit card being in your phone, not about how its an NFC payment option.

I think practically the USA will just skip over chip & pin and go pure NFC payments, kind of like landlines vs cellphones in developing countries.

Here's a second-hand account of why Uber is terrible and should be regulated heard from a finnish taxi driver a week ago:

1) Probably all of the Uber drivers are uninsured in the case of accident. Good luck getting your hospital bill covered if that happens and insurance company finds out you were taking an Uber.

2) There is no background check whatsoever for Uber drivers he told. They recently added a clause that requires Uber drivers to have taxi permit (or something similar) which is required by law but they do not actually check it but now the legal responsibility is out of their hands. He said something in the lines of that "bad apples" can start driving and remain much longer in Uber's system than while driving regular taxi.

3) There has been cases in which Uber drivers haven't paid any taxes and actually have been taking unemployment checks while driving. Sure not directly Uber's fault but again if their drivers were regulated I'm sure it would make checking their taxes much easier and Uber would pay pension etc. from the pay.

I think those were his main points if I recall correctly. In Finland regular taxi is well-respected and regulated so Uber has had little luck in succeeding to gain market share. Mostly foreign people use and drive Uber here.

#1 is false. Uber has an insurance: https://www.uber.com/newsroom/insurance-ridesharing-uber #2 is also false. There are background checks: https://help.uber.com/h/6970e704-95ac-4ed3-9355-e779a86db366

@rockinghigh #1 In paper yes it seems so. But quick googling shows me this page http://jukka-pekkakukkonen.puheenvuoro.uusisuomi.fi/223502-u... In which the guy goes through finnish Uber TOS which states that Uber is not liable of any damage to you or losses caused by the driver. Also because Uber drivers have the basic insurance for personal use but not for professional the insurance companies might decline compensation because it's against the terms of agreement.

#2 Also I think the point the taxi driver and (consequently I) was trying to make that Uber does not check can you actually be a professional driver. They might check your crime record but do you think that's all what it takes to be a taxi driver? Granted it might differ in your country but in Finland taxi drivers are well-respected because they behave like a customer servant should. And from what he said it seemed that Uber's process seemed a bit flaky "fill a form and you're an Uber driver" or something like that.

Have you no trust in me? :) If you show me a non-Uber source that debunks my claims please go ahead.

Considering how Uber was apparently wanting to evade to be considered a transportation service this is IMHO a correct decision.

Just because you're a startup/funded/unicorn does not mean that laws do not apply.

This is pretty much the biggest thing that will change the "new economy". The market has reached a point where rightfully so people start to wonder why IT startups should be evading laws. They should not.

Running a business comes with duties for everyone. That is in the end in the interest of all consumers.

I agree 100%. All this "disruption" thing is mostly about being in a grey zone where you can cut corners, avoid paying taxes and not respect regulations. The legal system will slowly catch up and the initial advantage will disappear. In the end this is how economy works.

AirBnB is next I guess.

> AirBnB is next I guess.

I think it already started. If you sublet your apartment you are either a landlord or a hotel service, and have to follow all the safety/fire/health/ regulations for one of those. It's pretty obvious you aren't supposed to be allowed to just "share" your apartment for a fee, where some startup unicorn takes a nice cut because they cornered the market with a web site.

So yes. Uber and AirBnB are innovators in the sense that they aggresively invade legal gray areas. I think they will fundamentally change markets (e.g. will cause taxi monopolies to be removed, or reduce the red tape hotel businesses) - but they won't exist in a decade doing what they do now.

There is one issue here: what Uber and AirBnB are doing is not a grey area.

Both transportation and renting are regulated markets for a reason: because we already have experience that infrastructure related markets without regulation will be abused.

While there are some issues in both taxi and hotel businesses, I strongly oppose to Uber and AirBnB being a solution. Both companies apply IT methods but none of them have contributed any fundamental improvements to transportation or renting so far.

A real disruption should involve producing a beneficial iteration that moves forward a topic.

- Uber did basically invest their disruption into the return of 19th century labour methods. - AirBnb is basically inflating rents.

All those unicorn sparkles aside, it is probably time to look at unicorns with a clearer view. Sustainable value is not created by lawless disruption.

> Both transportation and renting are regulated markets for a reason: because we already have experience that infrastructure related markets without regulation will be abused.

While that's true, that experience comes from a different time period. I don't agree with the idea of exploiting unenforced laws, but this is also an issue where the community, government, or regulatory bodies aren't reacting quickly enough.

There's this weird dissonance where people like the new ideas and convenience, but don't wish to revisit the rules around these industries for any reason.

If every person prefers to hail cabs from an app to get in an unmarked car, then the city or state or whichever body should be forced to contemplate medallions. And if people want to AirBNB, the community should find reasonable compromises in rules that keep everyone happy.

It seems like the law makers and citizens are taking a slide, forcing judges to evaluate crummy old laws against what look like scammy businesses that the people love.

> There's this weird dissonance where people like the new ideas and convenience, but don't wish to revisit the rules around these industries for any reason.

I do not think the issue is in most of these rules. Transportation has e.g. insurance enforced. Uber evades that rules and thus endangers customers. Willingly. And fights for continuing to do so.

The thing about Uber and AirBnB is a two-sided coin:

- laws should never be evaded. If a company like Uber wants to see laws change, there is a political process. But: that process can never start with breaking the law. - law makers need to wake up. Society is moving faster because of the internet, thus something like a revisiting cycle for laws should be mandatory in every industry.

But: that needs to come from us as citizens. We have to demand that every company needs to follow laws, and use lawful processes if they want change to be implemented.

Meanwhile, I still think companies willingly breaking laws to disrupt markets should be punished. That includes Uber and AirBnb and many others.

About time the greedy corporation start paying their drivers a living wage. Good to see Europe fighting back as US is regressing further into plutocracy.

Uber drivers in Banglore makes around 50K rupees profit each month. This is higher than many government jobs and similar to the salary of many software developers in India.

I've only ever ridden Uber over a period of two weeks - the last two. In India, in Pune.

The drivers more or less all complained about Uber cutting the incentives and margins, stating that they are making a low amount of money. Ola seems to be a contender that many local drivers flock to?

Yes, these drivers might've lied to me. I'm just putting this anecdote against your statement of 50k INR of profit/income: That's certainly not the impression I got when I had discussions about just that on my rides.

Depends on whether the drivers owned their cars or were renting. Many drivers rent from the actual car owners, they won't make much. The few who own their cars do well out of Uber.

They don't want more competition.

So I'm a white German IT guy in a suit in a car in India.

There's no reason to believe that I'm going to be competing with them anytime soon, nor is it likely that I have any locals that I'd praise Uber to if you pick me up from a hotel.

Can't believe that they'd lie for that reason?

How much does gas, maintenance and the car itself cost? Let's not even mention the higher risk of injury from being in a car all the time.

50K is the profit. An Uber driver in Banglore typically makes 120K+ rupees in a month. I got to know this while I was talking to an Uber driver during the ride.

Once again, you do not take the long term costs of car ownership into account. 50K might be the short term profit but certainly not the long term one.

And that's OK, Uber is built on people forgetting how much faster their car loses its value if driven so much and how much more large scale, expensive repairs will crop up. But not right now. It's a good trick but it's a trick and it's not in the driver's favor.

In my opinion, it’s hard to blame just a Uber. It would be different if they were making tons of money off the backs of their drivers, but they’re not. The real problem is that customers aren’t willing to pay what it “should” cost.

They are. Every other company is charging around what it "should" cost. It's just Uber who undercut them all, which was possible because a) they decided laws don't apply to them, so they can save on following regulations, b) they started to subsidize ride costs with VC money even more directly.

Some people paid what it "should" before Uber, but I'm also sure there are now a lot of people using Uber that wouldn't be taking a taxi at the "should" price.

Sure. And I would pay SpaceX to launch a banana into low Earth orbit, if it cost $10. Doesn't mean it should cost $10 - you need to also look at what's sustainable. Uber isn't; VC money is not infinite.

This ruling is pretty disastrous for Uber in some countries where there is ingrained corruption through regulation.

Take România for example: licenses are needed to operate, there is a limited number of them, winning licenses is a black box, there is a maximum limit to the price per kilometer, a phone operator service is required, physical systems that monitor the ride, no credit card taxi support legislation, no legal tipping, cars must be licensed for taxi, drivers need special taxes and tests (some are part time weekend drivers).

In short there is a lot of improvements that Uber brings but the legislation doesn’t cover (like GPS use) and there is no way to change those without hurting the real taxi drivers.

I'm not surprised that the American model of classifying your workers as "self-employed sub-contractors" isn't going to work out in Europe.

On topic: Yes, taxi laws needs to be revised. But that's a political issue.

Yes, taxi laws need to be revised, but there are sound reasons for licensing taxis operating in a city:

- Limiting the amount of traffic on the roads

- Ensuring that vehicles are nice enough (that there isn't a "race to the bottom")

- Ensuring that drivers are nice enough (qualified, not scary violent criminals)

- Ensuring that drivers are compelled to pick you up and drop you off no matter who/what you are, and where you are going.

- Ensuring that there is a central point of contact for hailing a taxi.

- No ambiguity about who and what is a taxi with regard to parking etc.

To be sure, a lot of licensed taxi services are pretty terrible. But thats not to say that the idea of licensed taxis is bad- its actually pretty reasonable.

Its worth noting that San Fransisco and the Bay Area was the "perfect storm" for creating Uber about 5 years ago- you had a fairly car-dependant transport network, an absolutely abominably terrible licensed taxi service, a lot of local skill in making web services, access to venture capital, (relatively) lax regulation, a healthy disregard for the working classes, and a naively/cynically optimistic view on self driving cars. But try to transfer those conditions to, say, a European city, and Uberization suddenly becomes a lot more difficult.

The only argument I've heard for licensing is coverage of rural service area.

Most of the others can be fixed by regulation of ride-sharing services.

The important question is - what implication does it have beyond the classification? Does Europe have different standards for cab firms to meet? Like employment, fare rules?

If you are digital services company then the only regulation you need to follow as those of your home jurisdiction. All relevant EU law is included in those regulations.

Transport services are specific exception to the single market where local jurisdiction can have different regulations and you need to follow the regulations in any jurisdiction your customers are present in.

Specific passenger insurance the first thing. You don't have that in Uber. Another special regulation is that taxis pay to the city council to operate. Uber drivers don't do that.

Fares are regulated and in many cases the start, per kilometre, and waiting charges are listed on a label inside the taxi.

Does that mean Uber now has to listen to all taxi rules and regulation in all of Europe?

Taxis are regulated locally, country by country, sometimes at municipality level.

I think most countries have already been of the opinion that Uber was a taxi service. And hence, prosecuted any violations they've made.

I know Uber have been shutdown in multiple places. Because regulators simplify declared that they considered it illegal.

So no, I don't think this will change much. This was probably a futile move by Uber trying to argue regulation didn't apply.

In Bucharest the city council just ruled that every taxi ride must go thru a central dispatch. This made all the apps/agregators illegal, Uber included.

Some legal taxi companies say will complain, because they can't imagine that we go back to '80s phone dispatch system, and the customers shall be able to use their apps to book the nearest taxi based on location, what a dispatch will not be able to do.

That's interesting, and sounds really disappointing. What are the reasons behind that decision?

Corrupt leadership inspired by the 80s "golden era". If they centralize the system, then they could pretend bribes for issuing taxi licenses.

That's sad, but also a political issue. You fix it by running for election.

I'm happy to avoid workarounds.. like an EU court redefining what a transportation service is.

Yes, some taxis are a pain in the ass. But that doesn't mean that Uber should not be playing under the same rules as everybody does, isn't it?

I have never used an Uber, Lyft or any ride share.

If any rule or requirement is needed for any and all ride sharing companies, including taxi services and even bus drivers is they take a road test to at least confirm they understand basic rules of the community or area they service.

I bike or walk everywhere. I don't have a car. The problem I see and have is almost every few minutes while biking in the bike lane in Austin, a Lyft, taxi, or other ride share stops right in front of me in the bike lane to either drop off or pick up people. I've even had honk at me from behind while I'm in the bike lane because they want to use it or make a right turn.

I've talked with a couple people about this and even seen police pull these people over. So, I am pretty sure it's not legal. I wish 2 things: 1) These drivers are required to confirm they know the basic/general rules of the road and 2) Police start enforcing these rules. I won't even bother mentioning that every single driver I see pass me is texting or talking on their phones (not hands free style).

"However, millions of Europeans are still prevented from using apps like ours. As our new CEO has said, it is appropriate to regulate services such as Uber and so we will continue the dialogue with cities across Europe. This is the approach we'll take to ensure everyone can get a reliable ride at the tap of a button."

This company is so full of shit!

Surprised as the current EU administration is usually quite keen to support the race to the bottom.

Sure it was sugar-coated but I thought this was obvious from the beginning?

bbc.com does not have SSL? :O

These are good news. Taxi sector is beyond screwed, we need better and cheaper services. I’m happy to see a successful and respectful company like Uber being the one leading the movement.

They provide that service by undercutting Taxis at a loss. I hope you're being sarcastic. Uber is anything by respectful .. and successful I guess in size, but not looking at their bottom line.

Undercutting taxis and at a loss are two separate issues. Taxis are overpriced in the US with or without Uber.

Taxis earned their plight.

I am still waiting for €50 refund for a pre-paid train station taxi booked through SCNF that never arrived. This whole nasty and violent attitude from French can drivers is also unacceptable. During their protests they actually attacked people with rocks and set cars on fire — while still trying to scheme and cheat passengers whenever possible.

I hope taxis all fail.

I can't tell if this is sarcasm

Of course it is. Hackernews tends to be extremely bad at telling so. Usually ends up with tons of downvotes.

Looks like the "Regulate Uber everywhere" trend is confirmed. Edit: I did not mean this as a bad thing, but as something that's normal and welcomed.

I don't see how classifying Uber as a minicab firm amounts to banning it?

"Banning" -> "Regulating"

Banning companies which subvert or break laws or regulations to gain competitive edge over those who follow laws and regulations is not and should not be controversial.

More like: "Uber should follow the same laws as other companies that want to operate in Europe".

I hope they do, since I consider the system far superior to traditional cabs, and would probably still use it if they had higher fares.

I still wonder why Uber is a thing. It makes no sense, it does not feel like something capable of reliable service and it got almost no use cases.

Is it just a passing fad of some sort, like fidget spinners?

VC money is try to see how far you can go by ignoring existing laws

> it got almost no use cases

You don't think calling cabs to your location, paying with your stored card, knowing the fixed cost beforehand is a valid usecase?

Uber didn't invent these things. My local taxi places have been doing them for years.

I just can't imagine that random people who play what is essentially a glorified computer game would be reliable enough to show up at 4AM and get me to the airport safely.

Or provide a reliable service in any other emergency or inconvenient situation - you don't use a taxi to go to the grocery store or to commute to work, you use it in emergencies.

I can see how an app to call a taxi and track rides is a good thing, but i can't see how having random people provide the actual rides is a good idea.

It's a cab company. What's there to understand?

I think GP is trying to understand why it has so much media exposure.

It has so much media exposure because on the one hand, it spends a lot of money on aggressively marketing itself (thus people talk about them), and on the other hand, in many places their business is entirely based on breaking local laws (thus people talk about them). Plus, they're beloved Silicon Valley unicorn (more talking) known for pulling off shady shit left and right (even more talking).

But beyond that, they're just a taxi company with a nice app and shitty attitude.

It's just a cab company. Depending where you live it might be better than the existing cab companies.

It's cheaper than some cab companies, but that's because it doesn't always comply with local regulation and because it's burning money from capital investors.

Uber doesn't make much sense in the UK, where you have the choice of taxis (can pick up from the side of the road, must use taximeters for pricing) and cabs (can't pick up from side of road, can pre-arrange a price).

It's a company built to exploit people's ignorance of how much it costs to drive your own car.

I am certainly surprised to not hear more about this and there has never been any study. It should be fairly easy to compare the income with the costs of running a car.

That being said, regular taxis used to be ripped off by the medallion and the car rental, so they might not do better.

The study should be fairly easy, check https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2017/11/22/mr-money-mustache...

There are calculators out there for this kind of stuff, in Canada I found https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/tax/busines... and http://caa.ca/car_costs/ both of which strongly point towards 0.5 CAD per km.

The french tax allowance: http://www.journaldunet.com/management/guide-du-management/1...

Around 0.4 euro/km for long distances.

edit: that articles makes no sense to me. I recall having a minimum charge around £6 in London. How can he have trips paying only 3 dollars?

for god sake, ppl are stupid. Uber just left, let those ppl use the old fancy taxi service, they will like it!

As long as Uber driver count isn’t artificially constrained with $500,000 “medallions”.

How do sick days and benefits calculate when “employees” are free to work as few or as many hours as they want? What happens if an “employee” chooses to drive more than 40 hours in a week or 8 hours in a day?

It still seems like there needs to be a new classification for “gig economy” workers. They’re neither normal employees nor are they independent contractors. It’s definitely something new.

$500,000 medallions seems to be a US 'innovation'.

Sick days and benefits will be calculated pro rata just like they are for people who work part time. It's not a hard system to create considering most companies have to do it already. There will be a contract that specifies that if you work a 40 hour week you get his much and if you work less you get that fraction of it. I would guess the contract would specify that overages don't accumulate more benefits but that's up to Uber to write into their contract.

The gig economy are exactly that, normal workers. Just because your work doesn't have regular hours doesn't mean we need an entirely new classification system.

The gig economy is for people who can decide how much to work, rather than accept how much to work. What you seem to be asking for is merely a functioning social safety net ("benefits"). If you want the government to mandate such things then just get the government to provide them and be done with it.

Do people that sell things on Amazon need to be provided benefits from Amazon? How about AirBnB hosts — should that company provide sick days? How is an independent person with a car selling a transportation product any different than someone selling widgets through Amazon? Perhaps the difference is that Uber sets prices?

I would offer that a free market solution to Uber is to allow drivers to set their own rates — that would result in a far more efficient market. Taxis ought to be able to set their own rates as well. It’s better than this price floor/ceiling situation we have now.

> Do people that sell things on Amazon need to be provided benefits from Amazon?

No, they're not working for Amazon. And if they're selling large amounts of things regularly, the local equivalent of IRS will kindly remind them that they should be doing it as a business.

> How about AirBnB hosts — should that company provide sick days?

No. But hosts putting their property on AirBnB regularly should also comply with appropriate regulations, which most likely will involve them registering as a business.

> How is an independent person with a car selling a transportation product any different than someone selling widgets through Amazon?

Same as above. Drop someone off to work in exchange for fuel money? Nobody cares. Start behaving like a transportation service, and the government will want you to register as a transportation service business.

One of the many tricks Uber tried to pull off is Schrödinger's employment - the drivers are to be independent contractors when it comes to liabilities and the taxman, but otherwise the drivers are to be like employees. But, as Uber is discovering, you really can't have it both ways.

Yes you've identified the key difference which is one of the tests used in UK courts to determine if someone is really a contractor or actually a disguised employee and ability to set price matters.

If Uber did let drivers set price then it wouldn't be facing these issues and would just be an arbitrage marketplace. Of course if they did that their prices wouldn't be low and they wouldn't be as popular since currently they subsidise pricing.

What if I work a 60 or 80 hour work week? Do I accumulate sick days faster? What about states that mandate 1.5x pay for every hour over 40 in a week or every hour over 8 in a day? Can I force minimum wage waiting around at 5am in areas with insufficient passengers?

There are no companies that "have to do it already" where employees also have complete and total control over the number of hours they work and in what location they work.

> Can I force minimum wage waiting around at 5am in areas with insufficient passengers?

In the EU, legally, yes, as long as Uber's stance is that if you are logged into the app, you are available for work and must accept fares. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003: "The SIMAP judgment defined all time when the worker was required to be present on site as actual working hours, for the purposes of work and rest calculations. The Jaeger judgment confirmed that this was the case even if workers could sleep when their services were not required."

Will Uber actually pay you minimum wage if you try this? No, they will fire you. Or they will implement a special mode in their app saying "thank you for trying to log in, but your services are currently not needed, so we won't let you".

Just because you aren't aware of the many many very detailed rules in this area, that doesn't mean that there are no rules.

If you read my original comment you'd see that the contract would specify whether you accumulate sick days faster or there is a cut off at a 40 hour week. The only they they need is to ensure that employees accumulate sick days at the rate mandated by law.

Again if the law mandates that then they have to pay that. They are free to implement something in their app to stop you working more than 40 hours a week if they want to.

Yes there are companies where you can choose your shift. There are companies where you choose where you work. I'm sure there are companies that allow both already. Also just because you do something new doesn't mean you suddenly don't have to follow the law. I can't say I'm the only company that allows employees to work from wherever they want as long as they wear a propeller hats therefore I don't have to provide sick pay.

They are most definitely independent contractors. In what way are they not?

For starters, there is no contract negotiation and they have no say in it. Everything is dictated by Uber as if they were the employer.

They're part-time employees with flexible/voluntary scheduling.

Spolier

Sure there is. You can choose to not enter based on existing terms. You can try to negotiate and be told no. That's how most open contracts work, including contract to hire firms in US Finance.

In many (if not all EU countries) in order to be considered contractors they have to show there is no single entity that provides the contracts/money.

That prevents companies from hiring their own employees as contractors and avoiding paying social tax or ensuring annual vacation, etc.

As stated earlier Uber have been banned already in some EU countries altogether unless they choose to register as taxi business and comply with the local (country/municipality) regulations.

Many of the drivers also work for Lyft or taxis. What's the single entity?

The claim is unsubstantiated: "...has 50,000 drivers across the country, most of whom work exclusively for Uber." [0] I very much doubt that drivers would be employed in a regular taxi company while taking Uber calls at the same time.

[0]: https://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/3020839/uber-loses...

I don't think that's what defines contractors or whatnot.

They’re neither normal employees nor are they independent contractors

They are perfectly well covered by the existing laws, they are simply part time shift workers. But they are employees for tax and benefits purposes. That's the bit that Uber are trying to dodge.

By this logic, all stock traders should be considered employees of the stock exchange they use. Uber is just like a stock exchange - a match making service.

* Traders/riders on a transaction/ride pay the exchange/Uber for this service.

* Traders/riders are free to trade/ride as much they want to, at any hour of the day, provided there's enough liquidity in the market (surge pricing etc.)

* If a trader doesn't cut a profit on a trade, it's the trader's problem not the exchange's

* If an Uber driver doesn't drive enough to earn a living wage, it's the driver's problem not Uber's.

The problem in your logic is that different industries have different regulation, like food industry has different rules then electronics, this regulation were created probably after bad things happen. As a user of Uber or classic taxi you should have same protections. Try imagine Uber for food, you put in an app what food you want to eat and some random person will bring you the food he cocked, the person is not qualified, the startup did not made enough background checks, maybe he cokes in a place with rats, if you get sick you can 1 star the person. My point is that analogies do not work that well when you change industry, P.S. I did not downvoted you

I would totally buy the food from the random person if it was cheap, convenient and had good user ratings.

People who can afford to only buy things with background checks and quality control and insurance should be free to buy those things, but it's a little mean to decide for everyone else. Some people can only afford the shitty version.

A random person cannot sell food to random person.

uber eats and deliveroo are only working with restaurants, they couldn't do otherwise.

Yes they can. It happens all the time, just not through a company. Probably not in Europe, though.

I am making a normative argument. I am aware that regulations prevent that sort of thing for good reasons. I say that there are also good reasons for not regulating. In everything there is a tradeoff.

Yeah, but the society calculated and decided that it is worth some extra cost to have clean food places and personnel then have to pay with lives or medical care. As a society we decided that this rules are better globally, even if some individuals would risk eating expired food because is cheaper.

If the society provides free medical care then I guess that is fair.

Yes, I am not from US so yes for US in Europe is fair to have this kind of rules and taxes on things that are bad for health like cigarettes and alcohol

I'm from the third world, where these sort of rules would just remove poor people's access to cheap stuff for no benefit.

I think even in US and Europe there is a significant minority of poor people for whom these sorts of rules are a net negative.

You think that allowing poor people to buy and eat expired and spoiled food is a good idea? You would get an epidemic and pay at least 10 times more and one person eating bad stuff could infect an entire village, so I disagree we should allow selling bad food, the companies would find ways to sell rotten flesh if it was legal and they would make some cool commercials and packaging for it.

The very fact that a company makes a cool commercial is a signal that they are willing to invest a lot of money to make their brand known. From there, people can infer that they won't just make their customers sick, change their name and location to escape the bad reputation, and do the same thing again somewhere else.

Poor people sell food to each other all the time without formal credentials, certifications, inspections and so on. Since they sell to each other, locally, to people who know them, they will only make each other sick on accident. And if someone has lots of accidents people will switch to a better cook. The amount of food poisoning will increase, but not to epidemic levels.

Society rarely gets its calculator out. Rule making tends to be a political process. Oftentimes, the rules are suboptimal. The “calculation” is just a convenient rationalization.

I assume even if I get an exact measuring function for cost vs benefits you will find a minority that will ask to use a different measurement function.

Sure, until you get sick.

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