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Comment by tomphoolery | Hacker News Reader

Honestly I never understood that social norm of not wearing a seatbelt in a taxi. I'm much more confident in my driving skills than some dude yelling in some foreign language on his cell phone the entire time we're driving because at least I'm focused on one thing at a time. Sometimes the taxi doesn't even have visible seatbelts in the back (this is Philly I'm talking about, where getting around regulation is only a $200 bribe away!).

The one great thing about Uber/Lyft/et. al. is how they forced the taxi companies to step up their game and make getting a cab less of a shithole experience, at least here in Philly. Cabs are much cleaner, the drivers are not always distracted with some bullshit, and you can even hail them with an app. Before Uber came around, taxis were well aware that they were the fastest way from point A to point B (if you don't have a bike), and they gave precisely zero fucks whether you were having a nice/safe time.

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I also never understood the social norm of not wearing a seatbelt in a taxi, but went along with it for my first few years living in New York.

I think the mention of "some dude yelling in some foreign language" is unnecessary. A person's native tongue says nothing of their intellectual capacity, nor of their ability to safely navigate a city.

" in some foreign language" is indeed irrelevant, I don't believe the "some dude yelling" (talking) is however. I've read different studies that suggest talking on the phone even while using bluetooth is severely distracting for the driver.

Andedotally, I've been in cars with taxi drivers who were on the phone when I got in and talked for the entire ride, whilst navigating a city traffic, while also looking at their gps to work out where I needed to go. I did not feel safe in the slightest.

If it ever happens again I'd like to think I could ask them in a polite way to end the conversation or exit the cab, but how?

For me, "yelling in some foreign language" is more disturbing because I don't know the argument he/she is trying to make. Is the yelling/frustration warranted or not?

Granted, when you're yelling at people on the street, it's likely roadrage and unwarranted in any language but, admittedly, that sense of rationality is slightly depressed in this situation.

There is a culture of not wearing the seat belt as a sign of trust.

When I was in Egypt, I'd get in the cab, wear my seat belt and the driver will look at me weird. "So you don't think I can drive?"

A few years later, the police started enforcing the law and most cabs didn't even have seat belts. You would get in and find a sort of belt that doesn't even tighten, hacked together only to circumvent the law.

Not to say that in the US it is any better. If you wear a seat belt while in the back seat, you are considered weird. It is a stigma that is not easy to get rid of especially for the younger generation.

Side note: I do get some dude yelling in English too. So yes, it is irrelevant.

"It isn't you I don't trust - it's all the other drivers out there!"

If you wear a seat belt while in the back seat, you are considered weird.

By definition doing anything outside of "normal" is weird, but in the case of social conventions it's usually because people just haven't thought about it enough. I'd rather be considered weird than be in a crash without a seatbelt on.

>If you wear a seat belt while in the back seat, you are considered weird.

Citation? I am sure this is true for some people, but this does not match my own experience or what I can find when searching the web.

Citation? The comment is the citation. OP is giving you personal experience.

While I view the Egypt portion of the comment as a personal experience, the US portion seems to be making claims that are more general.

Personally I never understood why to don't wear a seatbelt in any vehicle, even in a bus if there available I wear it.

Just because sometimes it does not depends on you, and even the best drivers can have an accident.

Considering the driving conventions in some other countries where lawlessness is the norm, I think the mention of yelling in a foreign language adds information.

Not only that, the professional driver is probably better at it than the poster...

Probably, yes. Taxis in NYC crash about half as much as other cars per mile: http://www.schallerconsult.com/taxi/crash06.htm

To top it off, getting in a taxi in NY for instance is a bit scary. The first time in one it was a wild ride.

I think people expect taxi drivers to get in less accidents because they are so seasoned. They can come within inches of other vehicles and dangers but with an indy 500 driving skill.

It seems like driving on the edge like this would encourage others to use a seat belt but alas when you have 3 people piled in the car for a short ride it gets overlooked. It really should be a standard to wear a seat belt.

Only kids school buses can get away with not wearing one and that is primarily because a school bus is so huge that others impacting it does little, and if a school bus driver had to seat belt all the kids it would take forever and the trip would be over before it started.

My kid's school bus requires seat belts (in NJ). Maybe because he's in kinder garden, but they really take the time to do it for all kids.

Funny enough, physically school buses are the vehicles that require seat belts the least. But politically probably the easiest to require seat belts in.

Yup, many states have 'click it or ticket' laws, yet school buses have no seat belts. The argument I heard growing up was that its 'actually more dangerous to wear one on a school bus'. I was never given a real justification to that, though. My adult assumption is that it's simply too expensive for cash-strapped school districts to upgrade, and the legislatures passing seatbelt laws don't want to increase school budgets to allow those upgrades.

Here is my guess as to the real reason those school buses have no seat belts: there is of course always at least one adult on the bus to supervise the children. If the bus had seat belts and one of the children were injured or killed while not buckled in, the employer of the supervising adult would face legal liability for neglecting to ensure that the child was buckling in.

Specifically, a complaint that the bus should have had belts can be met with the reply, "But that's the way school buses have always been." In contrast, there is no similarly-reasonable-sounding reply to the complaint, "If only the supervising adult had done his job and ensured that the kid was buckled in!"

>Honestly I never understood that social norm of not wearing a seatbelt in a taxi.

Same to the social norm of not wearing seatbelts in the backseat (which is where you usually are in a taxi).

Which is probably not going to end well for the people in the front seat in a sudden deceleration: http://roadsafety.transport.nsw.gov.au/stayingsafe/vehiclesa...

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