The only reason that Uber is using drivers right now is that they are perfecting their autonomous vehicle strategy. One part of that is that Uber is creating HUGE data sets of where people are being picked up, dropped off, and the optimal routes to take. This will be used by the company when they begin to release autonomous vehicles.

The idiots who are driving for Uber are basically giving Uber all the data so that within 5 to 10 years, they are replaced.

It's not just the data they collect, weren't there reports that they were tracking users at all times? And when they were being investigated in Quebec they remoted into the servers and started deleting data.

You could say that about most things man.

And?

The "idiots" are getting paid for their time, like any other job, and I'm pretty sure none of them are trying to make a career out of being an uber driver.

Actually many people are.

Here is a list of cars required for Uber black.

Uber BLACK Car List example

When requesting an UberBLACK, you can expect a pickup from a car similar to the ones below.

BMW 5-Series & 7-Series
Mercedes S/G/GL/GLA/GLC-Class+
Volvo XC90
Infiniti Q70
Lexus LS460
Audi A6/A7/A8
Hyundai Genesis
Jaguar XF/XJ
Range Rover
Porsche Cayenne & Macan
Rolls-Royce Phantom & Ghost
Cadillac Escalade
Volvo S80

You think if you could afford a car like that without Uber you would be driving with Uber.

Also Uber is taking jobs away from Taxi drivers who actually drive for a living.

This is an argument I've heard quite a few times before, and I always find it quite amusing. Assuming that Uber is taking jobs away from taxi drivers who drive taxis for a living, why is that such a bad thing?

1) There is nothing stopping taxi drivers from becoming Uber drivers.

2) If Uber as a business is taking customers away from the taxi industry, it is because Uber is ultimately providing a superior service. Competition is what brings the best out of a product / service.

3) To compensate for the taxi industry's losses, the provincial government is already planning to provide them with monetary assistance to help them improve their service. IMO, that is already a very generous offer to help them. In other lines of business, if a service or a product becomes obsolete, it seems unlikely / unreasonable to me that the government will provide financial assistance to keep propping them up, because that is a poor use of tax dollars. Essentially, the government financial assistance is bribe money to buy them out / shut them up. If the taxi industry doesn't want to take it, it will be their own loss.

Again, it makes no sense to try and resist the tides of change because those who do so will only end up at the losing end, or they end up hurting themselves.

What makes you think Taxi drivers are not also driving for uber? First doing a shift in there taxi then doing a shift for Uber. Now you have and a uber driver that has been driving for 15 plus hours. You really think that's safe?

If uber drivers and taxi drivers made similar wages there would not be such a problem.

If someone is bring in a $20000 to $40000 or more in equipment to use at work they should be getting paid more than minimum wage. Some are making less than minimum wage in the states.


Good article on pay from a driver: https://www.ridester.com/how-much-do-uber-drivers-make/

Manic, I don't see the point you are trying to make here. Or rather, I don't see how this example you mentioned is helping you in your argument. Whether someone is an exclusive taxi driver, and exclusive Uber driver, or something in between does not determine how much time they put into work. When I was young, I knew a taxi driver (owner) that did 16 hour stints in his taxi, and rented out his car for the remainder 8 hours. Granted, that was not in Canada. As another example, in a summer job that I did during my university years, I had a coworker that worked 2 jobs, usually leaving her with <6 hrs of rest time per day, and rarely more than a single day's worth of time off during any given month.

If someone wants to work a crazy number of hours, there is nothing that can stop them.

I am not familiar with the legal nature of how an Uber driver is defined. But for the most part, I'd think they are either considered self employed business operators or commissioned agents, but not employees. As such, the way they work is not governed by minimum wage laws. And guess what when someone does this kind of work? They may or may not make money. This is otherwise known as business risk. If they can't accept the business risk, they stop being Uber drivers. If they realize they are not making enough money to worth their while, they quit! This is how business and the labour market works!

The fact of the matter is, the current price and service quality of taxi is inferior to Uber. The taxi industry as it stands right now is falling behind the times. In many ways, the current taxi industry is a relic of the past, just like how physical paper mail is superseded by email at first, and now by numerous other means of communication; or how film cameras is superseded by digital film at first, and now decimated by the prevalence of camera phones; or how land lines are totally dominated by mobile communications. You don't see governments coming in to rescue Kodak when its photographic film division goes out of business. You don't see the provincial government paying BC Tel / Telus when their landline operations shrink. IMO, the taxi industry is already getting a very nice deal from the Libs.

1/2 of Uber drivers quit within the first year. Uber claims drivers make an average or $25 a hour that's complete B.S.

Uber considers here drivers independent contractors. In The U.K. uber lost a lawsuit and now there drivers a considered workers not independent contractors and have to be paid a minimum wage and be given vacation time.


In B.C. taxi drivers must be paid at least minimum wage and so should uber drivers.

Interpretation Guidelines Manual British Columbia Employment Standards Act and Regulations - Province of British Columbia

Driving for more than 15 hours? That doesn't make any sense as that is violating the NSC (national safety code).

As a professional operator, driving time cannot be more than 13 hours, duty time cannot be more than 14 hours.

This is just the gist of it, you can find out more information about the national safety code on ICBC website, under the commercial licensing book.

With today being St. Patricks day....good luck to anyone trying to get a cab!

If the (most) cab drivers provided better service or drove better without endangering themselves, passengers and other drivers, then this wouldnt have happen. Most of the taxi drivers provide shit poor service and rip off tourists...

One time I have a guest who check into out hotel in richmond and its been awhile since this new $20 airport to any richmond hotel thing came out.. this taxi drive charged $20 per person... $60 and the tourist didnt know any better and when I found out, I immediately called the taxi company and complained. The next morning, the manager came to apologize to the guest and refunded the full $60.

If the taxi company changed their model from pay after to pay before like uber, then it might be a game changer for them. They dont rip off guests (especially the drunk ones) like taking longer route or whatever. Taxi drivers dont get ripped off from people who pretend to not have money.

Lol fucking taxis, this reminds me of the last time me and my buddies took a cab back from Vancouver to Langley. We were all pretty drunk and when we got to our destination it was around $90 on the meter and the cabby says "oh this meter isn't working properly it should be over $100". We just laughed and told him tough shit. I wonder how many drunk people that line works on.

I knew your silly anti Uber rhetoric had to come from somewhere

Lol yes and it's not like their car just automatically stops and doesn't function any more if they keep working.

His point is who is monitoring these drivers? It's probably the only valid point he's made. (Albeit its an issue without uber as well so really it's not Uber's fault). The cab companies monitor their drivers to make sure that they don't drive for too long, its one of the benefits of having a regulated business operating the drivers.

Now on the other hand if I work as a cab driver for 10 hours a day, and then go drive my uber for another 8, boom I'm way over the limit, and neither company is any wiser as to what I have done.

Now this is all a moot point, because: I had a guy which got away doing this for awhile, he would drive for a local delivery company for 6-8 hours, and then go drive for translink 8-10 hours (and then later a private school bus company). He was in direct violation of his commercial drivers license.

I love how people are defending the cabbies "right to make a living", "uber can't come here, because then drivers won't make what they do now".

Yeah exactly, it's called an open job market. Pay the people what they are willing to be paid to perform a function. As long as Uber's aren't dangerous, and the drivers are involved in more incidents then regular regulated cabs, then let them do their thing.

This goes back exactly to the same arguments for and against $15 an hour minimum wage. It's trash, if you think $15 an hour minimum wage makes economic sense, you are exactly the type of retard who will probably be working for that minimum wage.

Lol!

Judge approves $27 million driver settlement in Lyft lawsuit | Reuters

I dont know about Lyft but I know Ubers goal is to eliminate human drivers. Thats something I can't stand behind.

thats the way of the future.. why do you think so many big tech companies are racing to be the first proper one

Do you know how many deaths human drivers account for per year? Autonomous vehicles could eliminate 99% of those deaths.

I'm sure some curmudgeonly old luddite said the same thing about motorized vehicles as he sat on his buggy as horses farted in his face

Aside from pleasure, humans driving for commuting purposes is unnecessarily dangerous and inefficient. I can see someone being spoiled living among the safer drivers in the world (all jokes aside) but go practically anywhere else on earth and see how bad the drivers are. Now replace them with automatic drivers and you made the world a safer, more efficient, more environmentally friendly place.

Agreed. One day driving will just become a hobby like horse-back riding, or golf or the like. We'll all become more efficient with our days, and costs should be lower as technically we should be able to "timeshare" our ownership of vehicles. Infact, it could be that ownership of vehicles will become history completely as we all transition to a shared economy of autonomous cars. They'll just become appliances that take us from A to B.

Which makes me assume that eventually you won't even be able to drive your manually controlled car on the road, you'll have to get it automatically towed to a closed track just to drive it, or your offroader out to FSRs :(