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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."
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.
The problem is that not everyone is in equal opportunity to invest. To some families/individuals, the cost of college in the US is trivial. To others, it's hugely prohibitive. This imparts a bias in which it's far easier for a certain segment of the population to pay for college than another (much larger) segment, which discourages the latter from attending college, which discourages a large portion of those who would actually be good at a particular career from getting the background and degree that they need to pursue it - leading to said positions being filled by less qualified individuals who simply came from personal (or more often, family) backgrounds with more money.
That's not to say that individuals from poor families can't reach success - far from it. But in this regard money is like the difficulty setting on a video game. Sure, someone who's really skilled may still beat it on the hardest setting, while someone who is lousy at the game may still lose on the easiest. But playing the game at a particular difficulty setting is going to skew the percentage of people who succeed at it. The "high scores" - the job market - is based around those who won the game without regard to what sort of difficulty setting they played at, and so naturally it's going to be skewed toward those who played at easier difficulty settings, rather than being an accurate list of who is really best at the game.
Beyond the base economic issues of wanting your nation's workers to be able to reach their maximum potential rather than having potentially brilliant scientists and engineers working retail, there's also the issue of happiness. Because people tend to work harder at jobs that they enjoy. But if someone gets locked into a particular career path that they don't enjoy or aren't good at, high costs of tuition (as well as a lack of a "safety net", such as universal healthcare) make a career change a hugely, often prohibitively costly endeavour. Where tuition is cheap and a safety net stronger, people who realize that they've headed down the wrong career path are much more likely to switch career paths and find one that they actually do enjoy and are good at, rather than being unhappy and unproductive for decades in the workforce.
Safety nets and universal tuition do have a cost, don't get me wrong. But having workers in the wrong career and not having people meet their potential has an even bigger cost.
Shiny New Australia.
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
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
I think after two attempts they noticed that it doesn't work.
The US are still in the learning phase.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
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.
*Free because college graduates pay back more in taxes to the government in 6 years than the cost of their education.
OK, I've heard of a lot of statements regarding our college graduates, but this bullshit takes the cake.
Why? Well because technically you need a fucking job in order to actually pay taxes on it.
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazi...
How US students get a university degree for free in Germany
By Franz Strasser BBC News, Germany
3 June 2015
While the cost of college education in the US has reached record highs, Germany has abandoned tuition fees altogether for German and international students alike. An increasing number of Americans are taking advantage and saving tens of thousands of dollars to get their degrees.
More than 4,600 US students are fully enrolled at Germany universities, an increase of 20% over three years. At the same time, the total student debt in the US has reached $1.3 trillion (£850 billion).
(Hunter Bliss, South Carolina.)
Each semester, Hunter pays a fee of â111 ($120) to the Technical University of Munich (TUM), one of the most highly regarded universities in Europe, to get his degree in physics.
Included in that fee is a public transportation ticket that enables Hunter to travel freely around Munich.
Health insurance for students in Germany is â80 ($87) a month, much less than what Amy would have had to pay in the US to add him to her plan.
To cover rent, mandatory health insurance and other expenses, Hunter's mother sends him between $6,000-7,000 each year.
At his nearest school back home, the University of South Carolina, that amount would not have covered the tuition fees. Even with scholarships, that would have totalled about $10,000 a year. Housing, books and living expenses would make that number much higher.
Research shows that the system is working, says Sebastian Fohrbeck of DAAD, and that 50% of foreign students stay in Germany.
"Even if people don't pay tuition fees, if only 40% stay for five years and pay taxes we recover the cost for the tuition and for the study places so that works out well."