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The Vancouver Sun reports that a Kamloops BC Yellow Cab company is threatening to outsource their dispatch operation to Pakistan. They blame the ruling Liberal government who, in a flurry of pre-election giveaways, decided to let Uber open shop in the province.
In a telephone interview with KTW from Pakistan, from where he emigrated decades ago, [Abdul] Rasheed placed blame at the foot of Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone, the province's transportation minister for the past four years.
The B.C. Liberals have pledged to bring in legislation and measures so ride-sharing companies such as Uber and Lyft can operate legally before Christmas.
"Looking at that, I knew a small company like us can't survive a multi-billion company," Rasheed said, noting he is forced to look at his costs. "We're looking at all infrastructure," he said. "Overhead is high."
The Liberals have promised measures to help taxi companies compete with ride-sharing firms, including putting in $1 million to develop a competing smartphone app and attempting to level the playing field for insurance and driver qualification.
Some night dispatch for Kamloops Yellow Cabs is now being done out of Pakistan, what Rasheed, who is in the South Asian country working on the program, called it an experiment to determine if it is practical.
There are about four dispatchers who work for Yellow Cabs.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bradley13 on Monday May 01 2017, @11:50AM (7 children)
This guy is threatening to have dispatching done from Pakistan? How long with people put up with that crap? Lousy phone connections, with people you can barely understand on the other end, who also don't know their way around your city. He's basically threatening to put himself out of business. Bright, real bright.
The larger question: Why is it so hard to have a decent, respectable, affordable taxi business?
- Want crappy companies with high prices and lousy service? Have the government sell medallions (or equivalent): this is a bribe paid to the government in return for the government prohibiting competition. No competition = no need to care about your customer.
- Want to kill the taxi market entirely? Have the government use the taxi services as a dumping ground for the unemployable (this happens in Switzerland). Few people take taxis to begin with; then the unemployment office "places" people with no other skills as taxi drivers; hence, there are too many taxis (none of whom know their way around); they get fares so rarely that they jack up the prices to nail people with no other choice; so even fewer people ever take a taxi...
In a few places, there actually is competition (despite government efforts), and taxi services work fairly well. My impression is that this is the case in the UK. Plenty of taxis, lots of people using them, reasonable prices. But you still have the government screwing things up - for example, a "limousine service" is not allowed to pick you up from the airport, even if you call them directly. But those limousine services are how individuals otherwise compete in the taxi market. Likely, that's what Uber drivers would classify as.
Is Uber a company trying to take advantage of their drivers? Maybe, even probably. So what? If you don't like it, don't drive for them. Drive for a taxi company. Drive for Lyft. Open your own 1-person limousine service. Do something else entirely. If Uber screws its drivers too badly, something else will replace it - there's really nothing special about the app and the service.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Monday May 01 2017, @12:02PM (2 children)
In many places the government doesn't even get the money. The artificial monopoly created drives up the value of the medallions, and the people that happen to have them sell them for huge prices. The actual government price is generally quite low, but basically they are "scalped". The real problem is that it's an artificial monopoly. Put out as may medallions as people want, and just ensure they have the proper licencing and insurance, etc.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @01:37PM
Artificial and violently imposed!
/ducks
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday May 01 2017, @03:15PM
The actual government price is generally quite low, but basically they are "scalped".
You'll find the "correct" people are doing the scalping. Those who made the right donations of freely given gifts expecting nothing in return of course.
Thats really the sore spot about Uber and the like. We got a system here that gets the right people money and power, and heres some damn app from the other side of the country messing up our thing.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @01:44PM (3 children)
> Why is it so hard to have a decent, respectable, affordable taxi business?
because it is a business.
Why is it so hard to have a decent, respectable, affordable business?
because of credit. Credit cannot coexist with free market capitalism, it supplies money that does not drive the market prices down, devours the assets when people go bust and can cover all expenses of maintaining such assets. Cancer.
To recap, money (=> black market) is what makes communism impossible in practice, credit (=> drugged market) is what makes capitalism impossible in practice.
There probably IS a way to do ethical credit, so maybe I should have said usury, whatever.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Monday May 01 2017, @02:36PM (1 child)
I experimented with a negative interest rate once (mainly because my economics professor said it was impossible). Ended up writing off that loan.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday May 01 2017, @03:30PM
The government has numerous programs for negative interest student loans.
If you make under a threshold they slowly write it off which is the same as a negative rate, and there are peace corps like deals where you work in the ghetto and get chunks of loan written off again its essentially a negative rate.
My favorite restaurant waitress has a good system going on her education degree, her tips are partially off the books and her loan is getting written off. If she hadn't gone to college she'd be much better off financially, probably someones trophy wife or making stacks of cash outside the service industry.
I wonder how this works with something like a theology degree where you can basically assume the government is funding the whole thing as very few priests become well paid enough to ever pay the loan back. Essentially we've pierced the separation of church and state such that religious scholars get free uni paid by the feds, which sounds so weird. I suppose its justified as not all priests took theology (I know one who took english lit) so its mere coincidence. As a priest I think he might be the highest paid english lit grad I have met ...
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday May 01 2017, @03:23PM
Credit cannot coexist with free market capitalism, it supplies money that does not drive the market prices down,
Technically our problem is the government participation in the "free" credit markets such that we pick the central bank interest rate to match the interest we'd like to budget for base on our government loans being bigger than many segments of the economy.
Then taxi driver credit ends up in direct competition with US treasury for credit and things get all Fed up. Many goods like real estate and taxi medallions are priced at what the market can afford to borrow, which is solely controlled by what the treasury would like the fed to decide how much they'll pay for the treasury loan, and then somehow real estate magically for no apparent reason 10x hyperinflates in value or ditto taxi medallions or whatever.
Also all credit markets are connected and numerous credit markets are completely and totally socialized right now, or so socialized that private market doesn't matter, look at government backed student loans, government backed (aka all) residential house mortgages...
Much as letting banks speculate in the financial markets ends poorly every time, letting the government take over the credit markets ends poorly every time.