[taxicabjesus]

I started taxi driving in early 2012. I'd drive my little 1994 Honda Civic Hatchback to the taxi yard and check out a cab for 12 hours or 24 hours. It was a pretty good deal: the taxi company took care of complying with Arizona's minimal taxi regulations, provided insurance and customers. I could do anything I wanted with their taxi, I just had to pay them at the end of the shift. I always made money, even on my 4th day when the dispatch system went down. On that day I found some people in downtown who'd scheduled a cab to go to the Frank Lloyd Wright museum in Scottsdale. The taxi was free that day. After the 'new driver' $20 off coupon the taxi company actually paid me to drive their taxi around.

Uber arrived in Phoenix ... in 2013 or 2014? I remember sitting at the Cardinals' football stadium. Another of the company's drivers had gotten an uber fare. He said something like, "it's not that cheap". We didn't realize at the time that what the driver got was not what the passengers paid (that is, drivers' pay was subsidized).

Things started to get bad for us taxi drivers in 2015. I remember sitting in old town Scottsdale. Two ladies were waiting for their ride-share driver to show up. A "gypsy-cab" driver (someone not associated with one of the big taxi companies - who'd gotten a taxi meter and insurance, and complied with Arizona's minimal licensing) asked if they needed a ride. The ladies said, "you're too expensive." A Honda Accord showed up, with two ladies in the front... I figured the female driver didn't feel safe driving around by herself late at night, and recruited her friend to copilot with her.

Cars are expensive. I'd made enough to upgrade my old honda civic to a Uber-acceptable Ford Fusion by ... 2013? (Truthfully my father paid for most of the vehicle, I took out a $5,000 loan.)

When I did the calculations on driving my Fusion for Uber, the numbers just didn't work. I figured I'd need a transmission sooner or later, and the miles really add up quickly when you're driving. We'd put 100,000 miles a year on our taxi-Priuses. The early years of 'ride sharing' was an exercise in Wall Street tricking people who wanted nice cars into wearing out their personal vehicles for barely minimum wage.

I took to blogging about my fares, initially at kuro5hin.org [rip]. Lots of stories... reposted them at https://www.TaxiWars.org/

Had this recent comment about the taxi industry get a couple upvotes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31065345 ("The company had economy of scale in their fleet operations that was hard to beat: mechanics who knew the Prius like the back of their hand, boneyards (for parts), connections in the automotive industry.")

On the one hand, Uber's software was better than our 'electronic taxi dispatch v1.0' system [0]. But Arizona's taxi regulations were so incredibly minimal, that it wasn't very fair for Governor Ducey, et al, to throw us under the bus.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVmm3kECLxw / http://www.taxiwars.org/p/electronic-taxi-dispatch-v1.html

[balderdash]

I’m glad you pointed the driver economics out, I meticulously keep track of my auto costs (hour out to road trip [1]) and am always surprised by what my actual mpg/cost per mile is, as well as how repairs and maintenance add up over time - I honestly don’t think most Uber drivers realize they are just trading deferred maintenance costs, and depreciation expense for cash now.

[1]https://apps.apple.com/us/app/road-trip-mpg/id298398207

[taxicabjesus]

A lot of miles were not paid for. A typical shift in the cab (12 hours) would have maybe 200 miles, with half of those being paid. I drove for an owner-operator - I think I paid her $75/shift for the use of her car... Maybe $20 for gas, and the rest paid me.

The taxi company put together a system where drivers could take their contract fares (such as in the video I linked) in personal vehicles. I had to get a commercial license plate. Then the company did a safety inspection on my car. Their contracts paid better than standard ride share fares, but the numbers still didn't work. I only did that a couple times. One time I got a solid fare, but it took me out to Apache Junction. It was 40 miles to get home. The technical term for unpaid miles is deadheading [0].

> I honestly don’t think most Uber drivers realize they are just trading deferred maintenance costs, and depreciation expense for cash now.

I referred to this as this 'economic cancer'. Professional drivers figure out how to keep their expenses down.

[0] "They report 40.8% of their total distance traveled (VMT) being lost to deadheading." https://www.caee.utexas.edu/prof/bhat/ABSTRACTS/RidehailingE...

[ciguy]

I am glad the taxi industry worked for you as a driver for a while. But it was unbelievably bad for consumers for so long, I have no sympathy for anyone related to the industry pre Uber at all. You might have been a good driver but most were not and frankly the odds aren't in your favor either. I am sincerely glad that the taxi industry got fucked as hard as it did, it forced them to at least think a little bit about customer experience and improve in some places.

[taxicabjesus]

The hn comment I linked told of how the company I drove for became the default cab company for the Phoenix area. One aspect was how passengers could file a complaint, and they'd look into it.

I got taken for a ride by a taxi driver in San Jose, cira 2003... That should have been a $20 fare, not a $100 fare, but I was naïve.

Sometimes my passengers would watch our route on their phone.