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Uber In Retreat Across Europe
HughPickens.com writes: Mark Scott reports at the NY Times that Uber is rapidly expanding its ride-hailing operations across the globe but some of Uber's fiercest opposition has come in Europe, where the culture clash between the remorseless competition of the US tech industry and the locals' respect for tradition and deference to established interests is especially stark. In Frankfort, Uber shut its office after just 18 months of operation spurred in part by drivers like Hasan Kurt, the owner of a local licensed taxi business, who had refused to work with the American service. Uber antagonized local taxi operators by prioritizing its low-cost service, and then could not persuade enough licensed drivers to sign up, even after it offered to pay for licenses and help with other regulatory costs that totaled as much as $400 for new drivers. "It's not part of the German culture to do something like" what Uber did says Kurt. "We don't like it, the government doesn't like it, and our customers don't like it."
Uber also pulled out of Hamburg and Düsseldorf after less than two years of operating in each of those German cities. In Amsterdam, Uber recently stopped offering UberPop, in Paris and Madrid, Uber has been confronted by often violent opposition from existing taxi operators, while in London, local regulators are mulling changes that could significantly hamper Uber's ambitions there. Uber's aggressive tactics have turned off potential customers like Andreas Müller who tried the company's Frankfurt service after first using Uber on a business trip in Chicago. Müller said he liked the convenience of paying through his smartphone, but soon turned against the company after reading that it had continued operating in violation of court orders and did not directly employ its drivers, who are independent contractors. "That might work in the U.S., but that's not how things are done here in Germany," says Müller. "Everyone must respect the rules."
Uber also pulled out of Hamburg and Düsseldorf after less than two years of operating in each of those German cities. In Amsterdam, Uber recently stopped offering UberPop, in Paris and Madrid, Uber has been confronted by often violent opposition from existing taxi operators, while in London, local regulators are mulling changes that could significantly hamper Uber's ambitions there. Uber's aggressive tactics have turned off potential customers like Andreas Müller who tried the company's Frankfurt service after first using Uber on a business trip in Chicago. Müller said he liked the convenience of paying through his smartphone, but soon turned against the company after reading that it had continued operating in violation of court orders and did not directly employ its drivers, who are independent contractors. "That might work in the U.S., but that's not how things are done here in Germany," says Müller. "Everyone must respect the rules."
truth+mercy=justice.. in the moms we trust..
It's what sets Europe apart from the oligarchies and part of what the city slickers want to get rid of in the UK.
You're holding humanity back as you've always been doing. The rest of the world is subsidizing your grandiose socialist pipedream.
There is no Law that trumps the right of a 'murican technology company to make money, apparently.
Who would have thought?
Here in Belgium (Brussels for me) lots of people used Uber, even after the threat to close them down. Its cheaper and more convenient than the expensive and slow taxi service. Most everyone I know has used them at least once and everyone (in my circle) was not happy with them pulling out of Brussels after threat of legal action.
I think if you talk to anyone who isn't a taxi driver or associated with the police, you'd find they like Uber and are not happy with the monopoly of the taxi service on this industry.
Of course, Belgium is well known as a 'fuck the rules' sort of country. But we're also the seat of the EU so the irony is not lost on me about this story.
Still, most people would have been happier if our fucking governments had found a way to work with Uber instead of just bowing over to the taxi unions.
Biassed much? This has jack shit to do with the "remorseless competition of the US tech industry and the locals' respect for tradition and deference to established interests".
It has to do by following the rules. They keep saying that they are not a taxi company, while they are. They try to get around all different kinds of laws, especially labour laws and that is not a good thing to do in Europe.
The thing I see is that when they follow the rules, they are NOT cheaper than the traditonal taxi companies.
So what "remorseless competition" means is actually "illegal operation of a business". It is like calling Corleones way of selling insurance "remorseless competition of European family businesses".
Uber is welcome if they play by the rules. They tried and did not make any money.
Do understand that in many places you can just become a taxi-driver by getting the correct papers. Not everywhere there are fixed limits or medaillions.
What the taxi companies should take away from this (and other places as well) is that people like the ease of use, especially in payment. People like the cashless society. There are options for taxi-drivers. I pay with my bank card if possible and that is something that is widely accepted.
The App is also a nice thing and I could see a role for Uber (or others) there. Set up a system where multiple companies can join so you can get a taxi easily. e.g. something like http://www.pizza.be/en/ where people can order from many different places in Belgium.
Do that on a European or even worldwide manner and you are golden.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Meanwhile, a mob of 1,000 men sexually assault over 100 women on NYE in public and the authorities are mostly dithering about teaching said immigrants to respect the rules.
So please, spare us the bullshit about how Germans respect the rules. What we see is a Germany that on rules strains gnats while swallowing camels.
I think they are not succeeding in countries with well established and (maybe) good quality taxi services. This is not the case for Bucharest. Here the taxi drivers are guys with no education that would not get a job otherwise. They always expect tip and can become violent if this is not provided (especially to women). They smoke even if you ask for a non smoking cab and some of their cars are pitiful (I don't expect leather but I want the heating to work). Uber imposes some rules on cars and you can rate drivers (and the rating is actually used by Uber as opposed to taxi firms). This makes their drivers act nicer, the cars are better and the whole experience is better. And not having to deal with cash money and tip is cool also.
many are you know the whole wwworld is watching.... progress
Uber is going to have troubles from the entrenched rent seekers rather than customers in protectionist markets like Paris or NYC.
Uber is going to have troubles from customers rather than existing ride services in well run markets like London or Frankfort.
It's a sliding scale of course and the exact mechanism of resistance will differ place to place, but interesting to watch all the same.
Uber does not make the people at the bottom rich. Its no different or better then what a traditional cab company does. In fact, its worse in many ways. We have already seen the playing field split between what Uber is required to do and what cab companies are required. No organized system, no uniform system of management, no core interest in playing by the rules. At some point you have to ask if Uber is positive or just another example of chaos.
Everyone I have talked to who has used Uber many times has never had a constant level of service. Its always been hit or miss. I am all for a free market and let the chip fall where they will. But let's play them on equal terms against your competition. I think Uber will fail when they have to do this.
once you guys learn the meaning, spelling and pronunciation of "über".
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
Don't worry about German culture, Uber. Wait a few years and it'll be "exterminated". They suicided.
This is about Uber pissing all over labour and transport regulations and getting in serious trouble because of that. ... ... sort-of-dependable here in Düsseldorf. ... idiots.
And competing against dependable and solid public transport networks.
Well, OK, scratch that
If only Rheinbahn could sync their online, offline and station timetables, that would be a huge plus
There's also a cottage industry of ride-sharing going on in Germany for quite some time now (roughly a decade) with platforms such as mitfahrgelegenheit.de or blahblahcar.de covering some interesting parts of the market that Uber tries to target. In terms of ride-sharing Uber is actually quite late in the game by German standards.
As for transportation and labour laws: I took a taxi just this moring because I'd've been late with the tram & bike combo I usually use. The ride took approx. 16 minutes and costed 22 euros, tip included. The car was a Mercedes (almost all Taxis are Mercedes in Germany), the drive has to have a special training and "Personentransport" (it's what you think it is) drivers licence, he gets paid - not very big but he can live - and is tied in to healthcare and all the other stuff every citizen enjoys in Germany.
Bottom line: With public transport and the occasional luxurious taxi ride when time is short I see not that much of a market for Uber. And as for them getting legal flak for not following regulations - that's a thing I'm quite OK with.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
I wonder, is their retreat due to a genuine disinterest by the populations of those countries or simply by anti-competitive practices by those countries "established interests"/governments? It almost sounds like at least in UberPops case that the general public was happy to use the service but the taxi companies/drivers "dissatisfaction" resulted in blocking traffic, government lobbying, destroying Uber cars and attacking their drivers. No doubt that Uber is a company that is more than anything interested in profits, but why people are ascribing different motivations to various established taxi companies across the globe is beyond me. Let them all provide their service and allow the public to decide which deserves to survive.
http://techcrunch.com/2015/06/...
Yeah, poor "innovators".
Look, here is what really happened:
We have existing taxi services that are actually quite good and regulated to the advantage of customers (for example, by law a taxi cannot refuse to drive you just because it's close by and he would prefer to wait for a higher fare customer).
My hometown, Hamburg, is mentioned, and for all my life my experience with taxis there is that it is easy to get one, they are clean, drivers speak good german and know the roads, fares are transparent and fair and for years before Uber appeared, there were already Apps that allowed you to order a taxi to your current location with a few clicks.
I don't know the situation in the USA, but over here not many people even saw the need for something like Uber. If you "disrupt" something that works reasonably well, you are acting destructively.
Maybe Uber is cheaper, but it is not as transparent or fair with its various surcharges and basically auction system. I'd rather know I will spend 20â to get to the airport than leave it up to chance and maybe today I'm lucky and pay only 15 - or maybe 30, who knows? If you want cheap, most of Europe has pretty good public transport (from my house to the airport: just over 3â and only 10 minutes longer than by taxi).
And then Uber came in with arrogance and hubris and basically said "fuck you all" not just to the taxi companies but also to regulators, police and the law. Sorry, but we here don't share the american "all government is the evil spawn of Satan" attitude. Sure we bitch about tax laws and we think our politicians are corrupt, incompetent imbeciles, but we also value the rule of law and wouldn't want to live in the wild west. We don't think companies and people who break the rules are innovators, we think they are assholes.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
... what a complete and utter bullshit: "... where the culture clash between the remorseless competition of the US tech industry and the locals' respect for tradition and deference to established interests is especially stark"
Maybe it's more that in Europe countries have not been taken over by commerce to the degree that has happened in the US. Maybe that NY Times reporter baby could buy a passport and take time to visit some European countries once.
Indeed, when you want to do a business in a country, you obey simple rules, nothing more, apparently Uber has issues with that, and perhaps that attitude is typically American, who knows.
That arrogant crap company is doing the same here in Indonesia; simply ignore laws and court orders, hoping they can strong arm local and national governments into compliance, disgusting!
We are proud of our social accomplishments and we do not like people who mess with it. Especially, when they think they do not need to work inside the law. It might be acceptable in the US to fuck the law and the people and make profit from it. Here, we do not like it. And frankly enough international companies are doing it. Therefore, we fight against that. Even though our governments are not really into it. Even though, they encouraged some companies to pay some taxes and accept the local laws.
they're in blatant violation of taxi laws in the u.s. too and just hide behind semantics... so yeah, fuck these guys.
......
i use taxi alot. I also live in denmark. Last year and a half, i took taxi to work in the morning almost exclusively, even though i live 1.7 kilometers from my workplace. I'mma lazy fuck, ehehe. While im in the taxi ,i like to talk to the driver, cos its less boring that way.
Anyway, the taxi drivers talk often about Uber, and how much they dislike the way it undercuts carefully engineered bureaucratic system that regulates everything about taxi business.
They say it is meaningless for them to be part of legal taxi ecosystem, when legitimate "illegal taxi service" such as Uber gets to exist. Also, the taxi driver is far worse off under Uber according to them, as the insurance on the car is not provided for in the same way as it would be, have they been under a legitimate (recognised by local bureaucrats) taxi company.
People do agree its a clever way to bypass existing regulation, but that its a bad idea for the career taxi driver overall.
I'll never use Uber because it impossible to ride anonymously or in private.
Every time you use Uber that information about the ride goes to some American company.
That can then share it at will with the NSA, FBI, etc.
I walk to a street corner, flag a taxi, pay with cash - there's no record in anyone's computer systems about where I went or when.
that's not how things are done here in Germany," says Müller. "Everyone must respect the rules."
Yeah, sure. Just like all those assholes in Köln a week ago did.
Cabs are not needed as often in European cities because of the lush public transit systems available, and are in general a convenience, rather than a necessity. You might take a cab to the airport because you have luggage, but the alternative is a five-minute walk on safe streets (before the "refugees" came, anyway) to a tram or Metro stop, rather than having to beseech some car-equipped friend for a ride.
Because taxis are a non-critical part of the city experience in Europe, they compete on service. No grimy cabbies who don't speak the local language, and they know the city.
I've taken a fair number of taxis in Rome over the past 5 years..
There's a flat fee from the airport to anywhere inside the Wall (maybe inside the GRA?): 50 Euro. If you book ahead, that's what everyone (non-taxi hire car) charges.
If the weather is terrible and you're out in the suburbs (outside the GRA) and want to get into town, there can be quite a wait for the radio cab to show up. Partly it's demand/surge, partly it's just that bad weather makes bad traffic, and Rome has pretty bad traffic most of the time.
Out of, say, 20 taxi rides, maybe 1 or 2 seemed a bit "out of the way" or wound up with a higher number on the meter than I expected. Those might have been just because the traffic was so bad, and the driver was trying to find a different route: these were both "outside GRA to inside the wall" trips, and the main radials (Via Salaria, Via Tiburtina) were packed.
Has anyone here met an Uber driver who is making a comfortable living driving for Uber full time? I haven't.
All the drivers I've spoken too are doing it for extra cash or barely scraping by.
This is my problem with Uber and the so-called sharing economy. The future looks like multiple part-time jobs and low pay to me.
the remorseless competition of the US tech industry
Uber is not a 'tech' company any more than pizzahut is for having an app. Stop pretending uber is anything other than a cab company that operates illegally and treats everyone involved like shit. Their customers, their employees and their competition are all just stepping stones to racking in money because idiots like techies think its 'great' for some unknown reason.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Uber may ultimately fail, but that doesn't really matter - something else similar will take its place, and the only question is one of how long the process will take. There is a strong parallel between Uber and Napster. In both cases a disruptive technology was used to render existing scarcities obsolete. Those vested in the status quo fought back, but continue to lose ground - the market 'spoke' in the way it always does, but in these cases the incumbents didn't like what the market was saying.
Napster is dead, but online sharing of music and videos is here to stay. Uber may die, but if it does then other services will take its place, and will be with us for a long time. Then, something else will come along to replace these services, and there will be hand-wringing and protests against the loss of the 'traditional' services. It's the way of the world.
And the true elites - the ones who could heat their mansions by burning thousand-dollar bills and still be obscenely rich after a few decades - just love these controversies. It keeps everyone's attention off of the fact that without extreme wealth concentration, everyone in the entire world could enjoy a decent and comfortable standard of living and quality of life while working cooperatively to limit population growth and reverse global warming. Yes, maybe it's time to cue the John Lennon song 'Imagine'; but the true and vast potential of humankind needs to be pointed out and acknowledged and encouraged more.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Donald, is that you?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Soviet Armored Blitz Reaches the Ruhr Valley - Uber Consolidates Losses and Retreats Across the Rhein.
A group of people defending their niche, red in tooth and claw, against progress. It will not happen immediately but, just as buggy drivers are gone, so will taxi drivers eventually. They'll be lucky if they can get another two decades.
When I would ask my grandfather what the difference was between the U.S. and Europe, he used to tell me that America was made up of the descendants of the European people who were willing to work hard and take the risk of a better life in the New World. Europe was made up of the descendants of the European people who were too lazy or frightened to leave the Old World.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
So idiocy runs in your family. Thanks for sharing.
Then your grandfather was an intellectually lazy bigot.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
With each post your perplexing signature makes more and more sense. You are so incredibly apt to lump all kinds of disparate people together under one simple label, to judge away and ascribe whatever motive you want to their actions. No wonder you are so confused about nearly every topic you discuss here.
When I would ask my grandfather what the difference was between the U.S. and Europe, he used to tell me that America was made up of the descendants of the European people who were willing to work hard and take the risk of a better life in the New World. Europe was made up of the descendants of the European people who were too lazy or frightened to leave the Old World.
What I don't understand is why they don't value money over absolutely everything else. What's wrong with these people?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Then your grandfather was an intellectually lazy bigot.
We have a number of them over here.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Lets face it, Taxi driver is a shit job, and Uber drivers are just trying to compete with honest people for shit jobs to make them shittier.
You might want to correct the summary...it's Frankfürt, not Frankfort.
Just another day in Paradise
Yeah, that's what the B ark inhabitants said that to themselves.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Having done a fair amount of genealogy, I'd say one of the biggest factors for coming to the US was having very little to lose.
Successful people tend not to pick up and leave everything and everyone they know. It's the people who didn't see a future in Europe that came to America - because of the local economy, or because they were raised as farmers but had no land to farm, etc.
...where the culture clash between the remorseless competition of the US tech industry and the locals' respect for tradition and deference to established interests is especially stark.
Bias much?
Uber is playing fast and dirty, but 'deference to established interests' is hardly any better, esp when they're just using the state to back their own anti-competitive shenanigans.
That may have been true 100 years ago, but today the U.S. is full of lazy bastards to buy their kids game consoles and smart phones instead of paying their rent/mortgage, and/or expect the state to give them whatever they need. Between our idiotic citizens and our fucked up government, the U.S. is screwed.
I LOVE Uber. Now getting someone to drive you is a reasonable cost.
These days, if I know I"m gonna be out drinking...I just plan to use Uber, and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg.
I just don't get what people have against the contractor paradigm. I personally LOVE doing it. I'm responsible for myself, I set my hours (for the most part)...I write so many things off to save on taxes, I make sure to set aside enough money for taxes, retirement, etc.
Yes, you have to put on your Big Boy pants, and be responsible...and if you don't want to do it, don't.
But I don't get all the hate on people that DO want to work that model.
And so far, all the Uber drivers I've met, seem to really like the flexible work model.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Actually, the original Europeans who came over here were tired of getting the short end of the religion stick, and wanted to be the bullies who got to define what religion was right.
That and Australia still was undiscovered...
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
At least in Germany. The rules are quite simple. From what I remember to transport people commercially you need:
A license. This is not hard to get. You have to take a test proving that you know the relevant regulations and the lay of the land. It costs some money to get but anyone can get it and there are no limitations for the number of licences given out.
Insurance. Private car insurance does not cover commercial transportation. You need a more expensive one.
A car that went through a technical test. Every car in Germany must be tested by a testing agency for road safety regularly. Cars used in commercial passenger transport must be tested in shorter intervals. I think its every year instead of every two but the test is the same.
That's it. There are some more regulations if you want the actual TAXI sign on top of your car and be allowed to pick up passengers that flag you down or park at a taxi stand but uber is not about that anyway so they do not count.
The problem is that once a driver calculates everything driving costs it's not profitable any more at what uber pays. The biggest cost is depreciation and maintenance on the vehicle. Only hobbyist drivers will forget about that. For them the license and insurance are prohibitive while they are only minor costs for a full time driver.
Why is Uber welcome in the uk?
Black taxis (the iconic meter driven type) here are prohibitively expensive.
Minicabs are incredibly unreliable and can have very dodgy drivers.
Ubers provides the following: credit card payment, instant booking and availability checking, ourney planner and destination address sync with the driver's GPS, A rating system for drivers and passengers.
They are also Available in areas where black taxi service doesn’t exist or is incredibly infrequent.
They offer extremely cheap prices for most journey types compared to black taxis/ minicabs.
For reorganization of debts, not liquidation. San Francisco is the epicenter of the sharing economy.
It's not the paradigm itself, it's that there's a lot of shady employers out there who want to call their employees "contractors" simply to shift all the risk - and none of the benefits - to them.
If you can afford to pick your jobs, good for you. Most people do whatever is available, and that means anything that makes it easier to screw them - such as getting called a "contractor" rather than an employee - is a threat and gets treated that way.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
I don't think Tesla would agree with you. My family history also does not jobe with that narrative.
I think the greatest reason to come to the US was greater opportunity, not some sort of forced migration of despair.
Yes, the willingness to embrace opportunity can be enhanced considerably by having no ties to cut, but if you look at a number of immigrants, they had some things going for them elsewhere, but they had a limit to how far they could go in Europe. Rightly or wrongly, the US represented nearly unlimited opportunity for those who could make a go of it. It was not easy to grasp that opportunity, but except perhaps for becoming President of the United States, there's nothing a that a naturalized citizen could not do.
Europe of that time was very different from today, with a still powerful aristocracy in most places that was not just a bunch of people with ornamental titles. This tended to limit opportunity considerably for those not of the proper class. Some people were quite able to live happy lives under that situation, but all opportunity eventually led straight having to deal with the landed and aristocratic classes.
Certainly, the people who didn't leave Europe had their reasons, and calling them cowards is ridiculous. If there was a bigger mass migration *from* Europe, it is quite possible that the opportunities would have opened up much closer to home for Europeans.
Jamestown pre-dates Plymouth by 13 years and had nothing to do with religion.
Yes, the freedom of being out from under the thumb of the established churches did make it easier for fringe groups to come and set up their own little theocracies, but that period is actually a fairly small portion of the colonial period. Once the colonial governments were put under Royal administration, they simply ended up as areas with a very Puritan culture, but not a particularly religious governance. No more so than most governments of the time, really.
so what you're saying is your grandfather was just as delusional and ignorant as you.
cool story bro.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
It depends on the time period, and which group of people you're talking about.
When the Irish came over during the famine, they didn't come for "greater opportunity", they came because their local economy was a disaster and they were starving (thanks to the asshole British). They were then mistreated and abused in their new home, but at least there was work for them and they could eat.
When the Puritans came over, they came because they were a bunch of wacky religious nuts who were unliked by the local populace in Europe and they wanted a place to practice their silliness without being hassled about it. At that time, there was no "America" as a nation, it was unsettled.
When Tesla came over, America was a rising industrial power in the midst of the Gilded Age, so for someone really smart and technologically-inclined from Serbia (not exactly an industrial power at the time), it was certainly a "land of opportunity" relative to his current home. It wasn't like he was sailing off to some undeveloped continent full of tribal natives.
Say what??
EVERYONE can pick their jobs. I don't know, at least in the US, where anyone is forced to take any particular job, no guns held to heads, etc.
If you don't see jobs you like, then you're not looking hard enough...or you're not flexible enough, you may need to move, etc.
No one is owed a good paying job that is convenient for you. You have to make the efforts to find what is appropriate for you, and if need be...go to the job.
It isn't like Uber is the only game in town...and besides, if someone is so poor they can't get any other job but Uber, I'm guessing they don't have the car quality to drive Uber, if they own a car at all.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The people who went to the US were largely those of relatively far-from-the-middle minority religious or political beliefs.
They went to the US in order to be free to prosecute others.
EVERYONE can pick their jobs. I don't know, at least in the US, where anyone is forced to take any particular job, no guns held to heads, etc.
Not every country has the incredibly high welfare standards of the US. /sarcasm
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
For there to be a "clash of cultures" there should be more than one. This is not the case. Europeans have a culture, usians do not. There is simply no comparison between we Aryan Herrenvolk and the mongrel untermensch that infest north america, a continent first discovered by Northern Europeans, proud members of the heroic Germanic folk. The inferior americans must bow to the superiority of Europe now and forever. Sieg Heil.
Uber hates regulations.
They say they welcome regulation, but when it happens, they whine and cry, then pack up and leave.
They say they have proper back ground checks for drivers, proper insurance, and safety checks for the cars.
In reality they do a public records check on drivers which is far less than what a police check does. They encourage drivers to use their personal insurance for Ubering and risk cancellation and being sued into oblivion when an accident happens.
The safety checks are nothing more than a cursory glance done at an oil change place, rather than a real MOT check done by a real mechanic, the same used if you were buying a used car.
The whole system is a house of cards built on suckers - drivers who work with uber risk their financial well being in an accident, scams by Uber to rent a car to you if you don't and charge you exorbitant to do it. Drivers are suing them in California to be classed as employees. Riders who risk themselves in an accident to save a buck on a trip and cry when Uber screws them with surge pricing.
Uber is gambling that self driving cars will be available before the they run out of venture capitalists willing to fund another year of operations.
"Every security scheme that is based on secrets eventually fails." - Steve Jobs
How can uber claim to not be a taxi company if it has full time drivers?
Game consoles and phones are very inexpensive and last years. Rents, mortgages, medical care, and education are expensive and are ongoing expenses.
Of course you'll buy your children a $100 game off craigslist even if you can't afford $900 a month on rent.
"It's not part of the German culture to do something like" what Uber did says Kurt. "We don't like it, the government doesn't like it, and our customers don't like it."
Once Uber has driven its competition out of business, anyone will be able to offer a service like Uber, because the barriers to entry will have been removed.
Yes, that is exactly what we see in other comercial areas such as
* On-line Book selling (uh I meant selling of nearly everything)
* On-line auctions
* Search engines (uh I meant news integrator, mobile OS vendor, and whatever else)
* Social networks
In all these areas, after the first guy opened the market we see the business spread evenly over more and more companies with none coming near a monopoly which it could potentially abuse to e.g. make experiments on its users.
>Most people do whatever is available
I know a couple of people who don't work because they make more on welfare. While this situation sucks, we can at least assume that Uber contractors are making a net positive amount of money compared to the unemployed.
Contractor abuse will end when the US has a proper welfare system that someone could live (uncomfortably) on. Until then, it's serfdom all over again.
I'm led to belive that one of the major reasons for poor potato crop was that most of the crop was a particular variety of potato. Which helped the blight spread. A diverse crop would have been clearly hit by blight but not to the same extent. Why everyone planted the same variety I don't know as it was a market economy. The people making that decision was unlikley to be the aristocratic landowners themselves (almost someone certainly that the current Irish population would like not to be considered Irish, also most likely not even in the country at the time) more likley it was the people responsible for the farm management (Irish middle class under the British). I think it's important to realise that Ireland under the British wasn't simply a case of master and servant but one all the classes that existed in the same way across the rest of the isles. The lower classes were being universally dicked upon and it was only really WWI that changed that.
I think after the famine the British government response in the short term was clearly poor however the longer term if creating a significant number of public works was quite sensible.
It's not the paradigm itself, it's that there's a lot of shady employers out there who want to call their employees "contractors" simply to shift all the risk - and none of the benefits - to them.
Thing is, at least in the USA 'most' cabbies are also considered contractors by the taxi companies. They actually have to rent the vehicle, pay a fee to the dispatcher to get fares, and rent the medallion in areas that require them.
I don't read AC A human right
Luckily for Australia we got the criminals not the religious extremist nut jobs.
stop trying to keep humanity in the dark ages you fucking losers. if you think you can keep a monopoly despite NOONE liking your shitty attitudes, poor local language skills, poor directions, scam pricing, youre crazy. FUCK TAXIS
Yes, much of Europe is neutered. Many (most?) have no real concept of what it's like to do anything you want (within reason), like starting a business of any kind, without having to ask permission from any "authority" figure. In the US we of course have laws, but the "status quo" is intended to be challenged, otherwise nothing progresses, and societies stagnate.
One thing to realize is that the situation is different in every area. $1M medallions is NYC and a few other spots. For example, I understand Uber is operating more or less completely legally as a black car service in NYC, while it's breaking the law(at least technically) in others. In a number of cases, insurance for example, Uber has adjusted to become compliant with laws.
I'll admit that I use NYC a lot in my Uber examples myself, because it's the most research I've done.
One thing to realize about the taxi companies complaining about rules and regulations - they lobbied for a lot of them themselves to better help keep the market to themselves. See 'regulatory capture'.
In the end, an easy to use rating system(where you're dropped if you go below ~4.3/5) seems to do more to ensure driver 'quality' and performance than all the rules and regulations Taxis face.
I don't read AC A human right
If you don't take a taxi to the airport, how do you get there? Just curious. I know my family normally tries to have somebody drop them off, but if that isn't available, a taxi seems to be a good backup.
I don't read AC A human right
What's wrong with it? It encourages conservation and more drivers coming out and working. I've heard people talk about people who only ever drive for Uber DURING surge pricing.
The alternative is likely more people NOT getting rides.
I don't read AC A human right
Uber is a view into the future in some ways. We've been working on working ourselves out of jobs since the industrial revolution and we're almost there.
First, replace all the full time employees with contractors, then replace all the contractors with self driving cars.
There are about 8 million jobs in the US for drivers, cabs, long haul trucking, delivery trucks, and all that will go away very quickly once self driving vehicles are available. So will jobs driving farming equipment, planes, and stuff I'm too lazy too think up.
Electric cars won't need the same kind of maintenance as fossil fueled vehicles, so less jobs for mechanics, so there's thousands more jobs gone.
Eventually, you have 9 billion people on a planet with only a few hundred million jobs.
So if you look at the ten year business plan of Uber, you can see Socialism way down at the bottom.
Job sharing, working part time, early retirement, those things would be good.
Or our Corporate overlords will keep all the jobs/money for themselves and the rest of us can eat Soylent Green.
No ever respects the poo.
-- I have monkeys in my pants.
Uber drivers are too dumb to realize they're getting fucked. After gas and car wear/tear, they're making less than minimum wage.
Grandad was an ignorant cunt.
Get over it.
"In Amsterdam, Uber recently stopped offering UberPop" Yes, this is true, but the rest of the sentence should probably read: After courts told them twice to stop.
Americans are, to put it mildly, obsessed with autos as a means of transport. In Europe, we have public transport that is often better (more efficient) than an auto. Taxis (in Amsterdam) where I live, are mostly used by tourists. Local people hardly ever use them because (well, mostly we travel by bike) the public transport option is far cheaper and just as efficient. No worry about parking, for example. And no long walks from the public transport stop to your destination.
What Uber is doing is not unlike opening a Kosher restaurant in Amman.
~_~ Not tonight, dear, I have a modem.
But it's not Europe's loss, though. Many parts of Europe have excellent taxi service - great cars, knowledgeable drivers, good training, adequate insurance. All Uber brings is an app, surge pricing, uninsured drivers, and worse-trained drivers. I know it might be hard for you to understand, but some countries didn't fuck up taxi services like the US seems to have done.
When I ask my grandfather, he says America was built by the descendants of the poor and misfits from Europe who went to the New World in the hope they could have a second chance at life.
I think you really missed the boat on this one. Merica is about a lot of people working really hard *for you* so *you* can be rich. Sucks if your the worker however.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
Everyone can pick their job, but not everyone can afford to pick their preferred job. There's a difference. You are arguing that he's wrong because you misunderstood him.
Learn to love Alaska
The thing with that business model is that the laws against slavery made that business practice illegal, and it was the cab companies, and others that got the laws against slavery repealed or modified to allow debt working.
Because of abuses after slavery was made illegal, it was illegal to make a worker rent his tools from you, and things like that. Such practices were used to re-enslave the recently unslaved. But slavery is back, in the form of mandatory employer fees. Gotta pay your employer to be able to work for them, and hope to make it back with tips. Cabbies sound like strippers.
Learn to love Alaska
Typical know it all ignorant fuck, it seems. Useally relatively informed people are less likely to presume to know the motives of those they don't know.
The more I know the more i realise I don't know.
Err..it has been that way since the dawn of time...
Who said life is fair and that everyone gets to do the job they "want" or would make them happy?
Sounds like the generation of everyone getting a trophy, and having their self esteem constantly propped up by having no losers, is hitting the workforce....?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Here in Montréal, Canada, there is a class action suit getting organised following outrageous fees being charged to customers on New Year's Eve (300$ for 20 min ride). They are also in trouble with municipal and provincial authorities because they are operating against the law, taxis are regulated and require permits in Québec. A taxi licence cost upwards of 200K$, so you can guess that taxi drivers are not to keen on Uber...
That's why Europeans hate Uber, IMHO.
Easy fix: jail the Uber execs.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Nobody said life was fair. But people have said that, all else equal, more fair would be better. Why do you want life to be less fair?
Learn to love Alaska
If you don't find a way to work WITH your market, you'll fail.
It's very important for consumers to overpay for goods and services, never mind reducing their quality of life, so that suppliers can be guaranteed a profit by their government. Everybody wins. Me, I'm happy to avoid discount stores, online shopping, coupons, and less expensive start-up businesses so that entrenched industries can stay profitable. I think that's the way God wants it.
The thing with that business model is that the laws against slavery made that business practice illegal, and it was the cab companies, and others that got the laws against slavery repealed or modified to allow debt working.
True.
I just bring it up because people are like "Oh, Uber is taking advantage of it's drivers by having them be 'contractors'!" When in reality, it's still better than most cab drivers are treated.
At least with Uber, the drivers are actually providing their own tools and setting their own hours, which makes them a step more like a subcontractor for a construction job.
I don't read AC A human right
Yeah, rub it in, why don't you?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Mobility from lower class to upper middle class is more likely to happen in the opportunity-less country they came from. There is plenty of opportunity in the US. Where people like Trump were born into billionaire families, and turned billions into a few more billions. Then talks about his rise from nothing.
The US spends time/money trying to convince the rest of the world it's the best, then keep everyone out. Why bother to do the two contrary things?
Learn to love Alaska
When the Puritans came over, they came because they were a bunch of wacky religious nuts who were unliked by the local populace in Europe and they wanted a place to practice their silliness without being hassled about it. At that time, there was no "America" as a nation, it was unsettled.
Puritans came here because they weren't allowed to force others to follow them. They didn't come here to find religious freedom, but to fight it.
And the Irish, Chinese, and others often came over to America because the US was so speparate from the world that a famine in Ireland had nothing to do with the US. Or instability after the abolition of slavery in Russia had no effect on the US. Before globalization, the US was still the new world. You couldn't just fly across the ocean in a few hours, so problems at home were generally limited to local areas, and the US was insulate from local economic problems across the oceans. Not because the US was the best, but because it wasn't where they were.
Learn to love Alaska
Yeah right, that and the trillions you stole from almost every other continent.
Much like we seem to be doing in our schools these days...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Having worked for a UK competitor for uber I can certainly say all minicab drivers fall into the contractor / self employed role. Hackney cab (iconic London Taxi) drivers are self employed too.
In reality it's one group of contractors moaning that the other have it better.
Living outside of zone 1 (approx 4 mile radius) in London means you rarely see a Hackney cab when you are traveling from home to elsewhere. So at a result uber gets the business.
Ok. But just why would you want a decent paying Job when there are a thousand people applying for every burger flipping job. Obvious the burger flipping job is where the action and the crowd is. The job may not be decent though. But I figure when the RC was reminded about human decency by the pagans a 1000 years ago, they should have ignored the idea
Puritans came here because they weren't allowed to force others to follow them.
Well, that's kinda what I said. A small minority group trying to be pushy and force others to follow their religion usually results in them being treated poorly (for good reason, people don't like assholes). So they needed to move someplace where they could be the majority and be assholes all they wanted.
It is a little disturbing how we romanticize the Pilgrims in our history books.
We romanticize everything. The south mentioned promotion of slavery as the #1 reason for seceding. Also mentioned was hating states rights. But not a single article of secession mentioned wanting stronger states rights as a reason to secede.
But these days, people still assert that protecting states rights was a reason for the war.
And the puritanical puritans are not remembered as such. Yet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... The first Black American pilot is unknown and unremembered. Possibly because the segregationist USA refused to allow him to serve as a pilot, so he fought for the USA under the French flag.
We refuse to acknowledge things, and romanticize others, to paint a rosy picture of the past. Another reason why old people are conservative. They have lost their minds (mis-remembering the past, and wanting to go back to the simpler times that never existed).
Learn to love Alaska
The price gouging model you mean. This is old, really old, not even the previous century the one before the eighteenth century. You drop the prices to put all competitors out of business and then you ramp them up, way way up when ever you can and once competitors are out of business the price stays up permanently and of course what drivers are paid also drops. Other business opportunities you can guarantee will occur, regional extortion, either pay an under table contribution to the company or face a permanent regional price hike. As for new competitors wait till they have invested enough, whilst you hold up your inflated prices to build a war chest and then hugely drop prices to put them out of business and as per 'FLEXIBLE' pricing rules raise them right back up again, which is why price gouging is against the law as being an anti-competitive practice.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
"There must be order; every thing has its place and every place has its thing; everyone must follow the perfectly legal rules."
Nicely done Dave!