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Comment by viscanti | Hacker News Reader

Could it be that they launched a feature to compensate drivers for waiting around (not getting paid as the customer only pays for on trip time) and they didn't intend to discriminate? I get that big tech companies are evil, but is the theory that they intentionally wanted to cause harm to disabled people? That doesn't seem to be supported by their actions once they were notified about the issue so it's weird to see concern about them doing it again in two years.

For customers who aren't disabled, should they be able to make drivers wait around for a long time or should they pay? If they should pay, how else would they give exemptions to disabled people? If they shouldn't pay, then why would drivers sit around not making money? It seems like it's fair to compensate those drivers for their time (most jobs work like that) and if people don't have a good reason for that, they should be paying for the time they're making that driver wait.

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Are you saying disabled people should pay more?

Why shouldn't they? They use more of service in this case time. So of course they should pay for it.

> Why shouldn't they?

Reasonable accommodations.

Is it still reasonable if it makes a contractor earn below minimum wage?

Is it still reasonable if it makes a small business spend thousands of dollars on a ramp?

As a society we said that is a reasonable cost of doing business in the US. Reasonable accommodations, it is the law of the land.

"the law of the land" is a really shitty argument for supporting something when its questioned. its an unfair burden on small businesses. large enough ones probably get enough business it makes sense to install.

Society had this debate in 1990 and it was more than a super majority that supported ADA. You're welcome to go look up about that debate that made it the law of the land, many people on this board are old enough to remember it. I promise you that people brought up the burden on small businesses back then too. It's not even a hard calculus to make if you're starting a new business. Is it worth it for me to open my business while paying the costs to ensure that everyone has reasonable access to my services. If you choose to put in steps, or have an old building with steps then you can decide the tradeoffs. If you're renting you can probably negotiate those costs with your landlord as the improvements will continue beyond your lease. These aren't surprise costs, they can be made ahead of time to decide if you have a viable business.

I've always wondered about stances like this: if the US economy ever falters will you consider whether these extra costs could have an impact on it? If enough people run the calculus that the business isn't worth opening then you end up with communities that don't have businesses serving them.

Villages in my country are losing their only stores because the stores don't get enough business to make it worth the cost. These are usually villages with a high average age. What happens to the residents? Many of the elderly don't have a car. They can't exactly go over to the next town and buy a week's worth of groceries if they can't carry these.

The store closing essentially kills off the village over time. Heavy additional costs to doing business can mean that a community just goes without any service at all. It might not be a common issue now, but if it ever does appear then it's not like you can turn the economy back on like you would flip a switch.

Do they have an impact? Sure. Are they large? In most cases no. A well kept and safe building is usually not going to have much trouble getting compliant. And once it’s compliant there isn’t much upkeep. If a business shuts down because of ADA costs, what is more likely is the building has major issues and it’s not worth throwing any more money at it. It’s a dying business.

Also, there is no ADA compliance inspector. One of their customers would have to sue or report them. If they get reported then the remediation is to come up with a plan to address the concerns in a reasonable time. You really only get in trouble when you start willfully refusing to address issues. Again, businesses have had decades to address these. If they close and kill a town now, it’s because they didn’t do the right thing when times were good for them.

how you answer that question depends on whether you're the one who needs the ramp.

my mom renovated a hotel. she kicked up such a fuss about having to put in an expensive elevator. a couple years later, I became a wheelchair user. without the elevator, I couldn't stay with her. she hasn't complained about the elevator requirement since, for some reason.

Yes.

But that is not the disabled person's fault. It is Uber's fault due to how they pay their contractors. If the contractor waiting around is actually "working" then they should be paid by Uber for that time.

They shouldn't because the government is mandating equity, not equality.

Isn't paying same for same work(in this case time spend servicing them) exactly equity? And not being forced to pay is not equity?

No. You don't pay Uber for someone's time, you pay Uber for rides.

You're confusing equity and equality.

Aren't you paying for person to provide you a time slot in their vehicle plus distance travelled? So equity would be to pay for both for same rate as anyone else.

No, you're paying Uber to go from point A to B. Uber decides what to pay drivers.

Which is billed by time and distance. Thus having to pay the same for both is equity.

The customer doesn't set any of that. That is between Uber and their drivers. Uber has a legal obligation to not charge different prices with reasonable accommodations to someone because they're disabled. They can of course pay the driver more, but that is between the driver and Uber.

Google "equity vs equality". There are people out there explaining the difference you're missing better than I could.

Charging the same per minute/mile is equality. Charging the same per ride is equity.

Dictionary definition is: "the quality of being fair and impartial."

To me paying same for the same resources is fair and impartial. Paying less is unfair and exploitative. Exploitative and being partial toward the possibly rich party that is the service buyer.

Why shouldn't they?

Because we are all citizens and all human beings, even the one with disabilities.

This is something that we, as a nation and a society, decided years ago, and we shouldn't throw out our ideals because they're inconvenient for tech companies.

They're saying the opposite.

I am saying disabled people should pay more, and the state should give them free money to cover the higher costs they incur for day to day services.

Trying to get every business to charge all customers equally, even when some customers are far more costly to serve is a bad model. Better to just let the business charge whatever the real cost of providing the service is, and directly subsidize the disabled person to cover that increased cost.

/Unpopular opinion

Why should the state subsidize Uber?

That's the wrong view. The state is subsidizing the disabled residents, so they can live their lives without undue burden. Those subsidizes might be used with Uber or a regular cab or some other transit provider.

If you reimburse Uber use, they'll nonzero amount of times choose Uber, keeping them in business.

And? We wouldn’t be reimbursing just for Uber, it would apply to any transit (I’m assuming taxis have the same problem). Running Uber out of business isn’t the point. Making the lives of citizens easier is the point. If Uber can make a business out of that, more power to them.

Are you suggesting disabled people receive a regular fixed sum from the government, or that they'd have to individually apply each trip for the compensation? Both seem problematic/inefficient to me, compared to having Uber being able to, for instance, reduce/offset their reportable taxable income to compensate for the cost of providing services to disabled customers.

>Are you suggesting disabled people receive a regular fixed sum from the government, or that they'd have to individually apply each trip for the compensation?

In France you get both.

A fixed sum for your handicap+a bit more money if you have rent to pay, which amount to +/- minimum wage(which is very livable in most cities besides Paris) And you get free cabs/transportation, my neighbor's kid get a cab every day of the week without having to pay a cent, same for a lot of kids in special ed, cancer patients, any serious disease even temporary mean you can get free cabs.

No, rides should be the same cost at point of sale (i.e. rider pays the same rate whether they're disabled or not) and then Uber/Taxi company bills the gov't for compensation for each trip.

Sounds equivalent to my suggestion (except it works for better for companies currently paying no corporate tax). Just waiting for someone to come along and argue we shouldn't be providing incentives for people to become disabled...

>Both seem problematic/inefficient to me, compared to having Uber being able to, for instance, reduce/offset their reportable taxable income to compensate for the cost of providing services to disabled customers.

And this is why the US tax code is a mile long with loopholes upon loopholes. It seems far more inefficient to me to get companies to play creative accounting than to give individuals some sum of money.

Possibly, but there are surely fewer companies eligible for making such a claim than there are individuals. Depends how automated you can make it I guess. And while I'm not one to get overly upset if certain compensation schemes are slightly vulnerable to fraud, you still need to maintain public trust in such a system for it to have long term viability, and individual- based schemes are surely more expensive to police/regulate.

yes if they use more resources. they should pay more.

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