[hylaride]

The traditional taxi industry was rife with corruption, bad experiences, and poor service in many jurisdictions before uber/lyft. As terrible of a human being that I think Travis Kalanick is, it was only going to take lawbreaking to overcome such a tainted system.

Medallion systems often prevented any competition, sometimes to absurd effect. The number of licenced taxis often didn't keep pace with population growth, sometimes even staying flat. Many drivers didn't own their own medallians then had to rent from owners, often making little money. In my city (Toronto) cabs were often dirty, broken, refused short distance fares (illegal) and smelled of cigarette smoke that was obviously from the driver.

Examples (paywalls, but you get the idea):

https://www.nytimes.com/1992/07/26/nyregion/amid-a-heritage-...

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-drive/adventure/red-li...

[nayuki]

Moreover, I believe Uber fundamentally solved two problems with taxis:

The driver can't scam the passenger. The driver can't set the meter wrong, drive an unnecessarily long route, or just be an outright unlicensed taxi. Instead, the driver maintains a relationship with Uber, and the passenger can preview the fare before committing.

The passenger can't scam the driver. In a traditional taxi, you could theoretically just walk out ("dine and dash" style). The passenger can also make a call to dispatch and not show up for the ride. Instead, the passenger maintains a relationship with Uber, and the driver doesn't need to handle any payments.

> Medallion systems often prevented any competition, sometimes to absurd effect. The number of licenced taxis often didn't keep pace with population growth, sometimes even staying flat.

And thus medallion owners collect economic rent on their artificially scarce resource, distorting the free market. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_rent

[andrewaylett]

Meanwhile, in places with sensible rules about taxis and private hire, the only thing that Uber did was make it easier for people to break the rules. And rack up an enormous tax bill that they somehow believed they'd be able to get out of paying.

https://www.londonreconnections.com/2021/uber-loses-appeal-a...

[cratermoon]

> The driver can't scam the passenger

> The passenger can't scam the driver.

Progress! Uber scams both passenger and driver. Hooray for Free Markets™!

[nayuki]

> Uber scams both passenger and driver.

Then why do people keep using it? It seems like a pretty transactional relationship to me. If drivers aren't getting paid as much as they wanted, they should find another job with a higher price. If passengers are paying more than they wanted, then they should find another way to call a taxi with a lower price.

[cratermoon]

> they should find another way to call a taxi with a lower price.

like what? Uber's business plan was always about eliminating competition. The company successfully did so by undercutting prices, only to jack them up when they had the market to themselves. There is no Free Market Fairy way to fix that.

[umanwizard]

Under what definition of “scam” is that the case?

[cratermoon]

https://locusmag.com/2024/05/cory-doctorow-no-one-is-the-ens...

[TeMPOraL]

It sucked, but not everywhere equally. Meanwhile, Uber rode their one-trick pony (an app), which everyone quickly replicated, all the way to upending taxi businesses worldwide, thanks to their infinite money supply letting them survive long enough in any new market to get the public behind them, which took away support from local regulators trying to keep the market from being gutted by what at this point was a multinational corporation (and technically a criminal enterprise).

Sure, taxi services aren't usually known to be paragons of virtue, but then they weren't that bad everywhere; Uber is just another case of an US org trying to address an US-specific problem and then bludgeoning the entire world with their solution, whether the rest of the planet has such problems or not.

[ChadNauseam]

That seems a little dramatic. They never forced anyone to take an uber right? If taxis were so amazing in other countries why would anyone be interested in switching to uber?

[mrguyorama]

Uber was able to subsidize prices, that's why.

[theshackleford]

> It sucked, but not everywhere equally.

Ok, but “everywhere” isn’t my problem. They sucked everywhere I had to use one which is my problem.

> they weren’t that bad everywhere

They were beyond a joke where I am from, which is not the US. Even today, they remain a worse option.

> US specific problem

There was nothing US specific about it.

[slices]

I've never been a huge user of either, but my worst Uber ride was much better than my best taxi ride.

[ses1984]

The last time I dragged my family into a taxi because of my anti Uber ideology, the driver stank to hell of body odor, asked me to input directions on his phone covered with dried snot from him sneezing with his mouth open, he drove dangerously under the speed limit on the freeway, and it took twice as long to get home as normal.

But at least I didn’t give Uber any money…

[derektank]

I'm immediately reminded of the Slavoj Zizek quote,

"I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology"

[jamespo]

Strange, my last Uber driver had BO. Normally they are fine however.

[harrison_clarke]

in my experience, taxi quality varies wildly depending on where you are

in bay area, it absolutely makes sense to invent uber, because the taxis were awful. and in vancouver (canada), they're also awful, and deserve the disruption: they would often tell you it'd be a 40 minute wait, and then just not show up

taxis in new york were and continue to be totally fine. you just stand outside and get in ~20 seconds later, with no hassles or apps. i've been in an uber/lyft a handful of times in nyc, but they're just worse (possibly cheaper, but the subway also gives them stiff competition, and i don't care that much if i'm in enough of a hurry to take a cab)

[selectodude]

>taxis in new york were and continue to be totally fine. you just stand outside and get in ~20 seconds later, with no hassles or apps

Unless you weren't white, or you wanted to leave Manhattan (or even go north of 96th street). Otherwise, yeah I guess they were okay.

[avidiax]

Vancouver was a great example of the corruption inherent in monopolies. Vancouver had neither Lyft nor Uber until 2020. I heard (internally, when I used to work for Uber) that the reason is that some politicians there had a personal stake in the taxis, so they got a $50 minimum fare passed for all booked rides.

The thing that Uber and Lyft really provided was a surveillance economy to keep both the drivers and riders somewhat in-line. Without it, every ride is an almost anonymous one-shot transaction with almost no recourse on one side, so the game theory suggests that service only has to be good enough that the police aren't called.

https://www.urbanyvr.com/uber-lyft-vancouver-launches/

[umanwizard]

> taxis in new york were and continue to be totally fine. you just stand outside and get in ~20 seconds later, with no hassles or apps.

This is only true in a small subset of New York.

[dboreham]

When it's not raining.