[harshpotatoes]

So I understand that on of the main points of contention is that the paris cab drivers face steep regulation in the form of requiring an expensive license, while the Uber drivers require no such license, and that to counter this lack of regulation they require the Uber drivers to wait 15minutes before picking up their customer.

But there are still a few things I don't understand: Why do the Paris cab drivers require such regulations? How come the Uber drivers aren't required to have such a license? And maybe I don't completely understand the advantages of Uber (because I've never used a cab before), but at first glance, it seems the main reason uber is succeeding so well, is that there is an app to quickly summon a driver. So why doesn't such an app exist to call these licensed drivers who are so angry?

[ig1]

Taxis are regulated in most countries, typically in exchange for a fee and following a set of regulation they'll get the exclusive right to pick up people on the street.

The precise regulations vary but generally the type of things they include are:

  * Criminal background check
  * Level of city knowledge
  * State of car
  * Prohibited to refuse to pick someone up
  * Prohibited to refuse short journeys
  * Regulated pricing
  * Rules on detours

[simias]

Most of those regulations don't work anymore though, being a cab driver in 2014 with the GPS and all the technology is not the same as it used to be. In paris I take the taxi mostly to go to the airport (it's too expensive for anything else) and most drivers have to use their GPS to get me there. I would expect a taxi driver to know how to get to the airport from Paris.

I'm not generally against regulation but being french and living in paris I cannot really defend the cab drivers. Riding a cab in Paris is pretty expensive and the drivers are often rude (even by french standards). Many of them try to "scam" you anyway by pretending that their card machine is broken so you have to pay cash or others. If you read french you can find a bunch of testimonies here[1]. The title is "why I don't want to take the taxi anymore".

That being said while I'm in favour of deregulation those people have paid upwards of 200 000 euros for their licenses so I understand that they fight for the status quo.

I wish they would fight by improving their services instead of harassing people though. I wonder how this'll turn out. Maybe the state can reimburse the cost of their licenses? That would seem fair but I really doubt the government would do that in the current economic situation...

[1] http://transports.blog.lemonde.fr/2014/01/12/pourquoi-je-nai...

[bertil]

I can certify that taxi drivers in Paris casually refuse more than half their rides, based on skin color alone — and openly confess that to anyone, no need to ask — and they have committed enough road infraction in any sitting to loose their driving license for good.

[brohee]

Not my experience, but seriously, report them, it's obviously illegal.

[bertil]

I generally use taxis when I'm late for a plane, so the only thing I could do was call:

- Police department say they see issues frequently, but clients are often foreigners, and unable to testify;

- the head office, G7 (because they need to be named and shamed) reaction was that hiring and paying road criminals was not their concern. After making that phone call several times, I support long prison sentences for the executives of that company.

[Sanddancer]

I'd argue that a system that tests on practical taxi driving, such as London's Knowledge would be a much more useful way of vetting taxi drivers than Paris' system of limiting it to whoever can pay a quarter million euros for a medallion.

[brohee]

There is an additional, pretty hard to pass exam.

[stonemetal]

The problem with cabs is when they are circulating looking for work. They are causing congestion for no real benefit. Regulation caps how much useless congestion there is by capping the number of cabs on the road.

Limo companies don't cause this unneeded congestion because they only go out when they have a job to do, so there is no need to regulate the number of limos on the street. Whether or not Uber should be regulated depends on what their drivers do with their down time. Do they trawl the streets or do they get off of them? It seems like they should get off the road since they can't really pick people up without a reservation. However they may trawl good spots for pickups like near bars or something in which case they are causing unneeded traffic and should be regulated.

[dnautics]

most limo services (don't know about uber) offer fixed rates (time or distance). Since Taxis pick you up and start running a taximeter to charge you, that's something that needs to be regulated to make sure that they don't stiff you. If a limo service shows you the route and gives you a quote on the cost, then there would be no need for that level of regulation as well.

There are some regulations that should be there in common, such as protections for the passenger (since you're effectively imprisoned) but stuff like background checks should suffice and I'm pretty sure that Uber and the other companies do this.

[harshpotatoes]

That makes sense. So i guess from the perspective of the regulators the options are now either prevent the uber cabs from being flagged down from the street to remove the incentive to roam the street and keep the limo/cab markets separate and ensure the streets remain clearish. Or, remove the regulations, find some way to appease the old cabbies (refund the large license fee), and hope the lack of regulation does not cause huge traffic problems (maybe ticket loitering or cruising, as done in some small towns).

[mattlutze]

Paris has an incredibly strong Taxi union, which has enjoyed it's monopoly for many decades. Uber cars not being unionized means they are taking money from this massive institution. I think, quite simply, it's cronyism.

Also, the 15 minute wait is because the taxis-by-dispatch are inherently slower. Instead of trying to compete, the taxi union pushed hard on Paris and got them to pass the restriction.

Generally, rather than innovating and trying to compete, the taxi companies in the union have taken the much simpler route of attempting to blockade the upstart.

[julienchastang]

Agreed. The taxi situation in Paris has been a pain in the ass for a long time. Ever try to get a taxi to go to the train station or airport on a busy day? Sometimes you can't get one b/c of the artificially low number of taxis in Paris. Each successive government in France tries to do something about the taxi unions and fails. Uber will succeed hopefully. http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142412788732455780...

[jbigelow76]

    >Also, the 15 minute wait is because the taxis-by-dispatch are inherently slower. Instead of trying to compete, the taxi union pushed hard on Paris and got them to pass the restriction.

Two months ago when Dallas' incumbent Taxi monopoly tried to pressure the assistant city manager into regulating Uber out of the market a 30 minute forced delay was a tactic they tried push through as well (among a few others like using the Dallas Police vice dept. to gin up phoney stings).

Luckily the community rallied, Uber drivers got to continue operating, which everyone but the incumbent viewed as fair since the Uber drivers were already licensed limo operators and the incumbent had some insurance problems exposed when the local reporters picked up the story.

[caruber]

Taxi Unions have dog in the fight. They have paid hefty licensing fees to the govt and ask for rights in return.

If uber pays 1M $ OR 500K Euros for every taxi license, uber will ask much more than what Taxi unions are asking for.

The other way to solve the issue is let govt repay the money to taxi owners and allow everybody to compete on equal footing.

[sologoub]

Do you have a source for the $1M taxi license claim? Don't see how this can provide any reasonable ROI… or is this for a large cab company?

EDIT: a below comment posted that it's 230k Euros max in Paris...

[caruber]

Sorry i was not clear. 1 M price tag is for NYC medallion. This article quotes 250K Euros for taxi license in Paris: http://www.rudebaguette.com/2013/08/07/anatomy-of-the-paris-...

[maerF0x0]

I cant speak directly for Paris, but in my home town, one reason we limit the number of taxi cabs is because we've decided (as a society regulating itself) that too many cabs is a social problem. It may sound funny, but imagine a case where there is a lineup of 200 cabs clogging the airport to get that one lucrative fare. Alternatively, outside of a office building to aim for CEOs. They take up a common good that is free (space and to some extent air quality) and therefore are a tragedy of the commons case.

[nknighthb]

Have you experienced "too many cabs"? How do you know the "social problems" aren't just imagined? How do you know they cannot be controlled in other ways?

You imagine "200 cabs clogging the airport" -- have you seen how cabs work in places where they are plentiful? There's no point in having 200 at an airport at once. They don't take passengers at random, they line up and wait their turn.

If there are a lot of cabs at an airport, the drivers will be better off going into the city and finding a fare there than waiting in a line of 200 cabs.

If there is actually such demand that 200 would "clog" the airport at once, they're obviously solving a problem that isn't being solved by alternative means, such as cheaper and more efficient busses and trains.

Why would drivers aim for CEOs? Cab fares are regulated, so that just leaves tips (something not even customary in many places). They'll get more in a couple hours driving around than waiting for the lottery in the form of an abnormally generous CEO.

[bunderbunder]

This is a good point. In most cities, cabs do not go to the airport unless they have to.

It just isn't a good use of their time - if you drive all the way out there with an empty cab, you've just sunk a whole lot of gas and time on a deadhead when you could have spent the same on picking up several fares downtown. And even when you have someone who wants a ride out to the airport, it's not necessarily something you want to do because then for a return fare you've got to go to the cab stand and take whoever you get wherever they want to go - which could be somewhere way out in the weeds so you still end up stuck with a dead head. That's the reason why in most cities there are actual laws on the books saying cab drivers aren't allowed to refuse to take you to the airport - without those laws, many of them would.

[maerF0x0]

Maybe the specifics of my town are different, it costs ~$60 to go from my house to the airport, thats really good money for 40 minutes / 25kms. Maybe 60 minutes of spent time? (20 minutes to get to me + 40 minutes to get to airport). Expenses on a car are < 50c a km. So $12.50 in auto expenses + $47.50 for 1 hr work.

[maerF0x0]

I never said it was the smartest answer to the solution, merely gave the "reason" behind the politics. W/o the regulation to line up, maybe they wouldnt?

You've made lots of statements about how things would work, which I doubt you could back up w/ evidence.

[nknighthb]

You want evidence, go visit Taipei. Where's your evidence?

[mcguire]

2001: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/local/archives/2001/03/12/00...

2005: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2005/11/26/2...

[nknighthb]

The 2005 article is irrelevant to any point I've been making, and the 2001 article is both ancient and matches not at all my actual experience living in Taipei this decade. Both are from a source with all the integrity of Fox News.

[avar]

I can't speak for Paris either, but when I was in Accra in Ghana around 10 years ago I found their approach to taxis fascinating. I don't know their regulations for them but they seem to be effectively unregulated.

In that city what seemed like every 10th car or so is a taxi, it'll take you no more than 30 seconds at almost any given point in the taxi to hail a cab. By social convention the cab will stop for you even if it already has passengers, if the passengers are going to a similar location they'll ad-hoc split the fee.

It was cheap enough due to the unregulated nature that you could take a cab for all your trips, and there was almost no incentive to have a car in the city. The number of cars overall was probably drastically reduced, and it was a much more efficient system than any similarly sized metro bus or tram system I've been to in a similarly sized city.

I don't know what the ideal system is, but consider the tragedy of the commons you might be imposing by artificially driving up the price of what might effectively become small ad-hoc point-to-point public transportation in lieu of personal vehicles for everyone, or a larger and less efficient public transportation system.

[john_b]

It seems like if anything resembling a normal, competitive market experienced the situation of "too many cabs" it would self correct quickly as the rates for individual drivers would plummet. Sitting in a line of 200 cabs for one paltry fare would not be a viable way to operate a cab.

[mattlutze]

Most of those 200 cabs would soon disappear, because a cabbie cannot keep cabbing if he/she doesn't get fares.

I wouldn't be surprised if some folks that own taxi companies in your city lobbied the council-people with that social good argument, as a means to maintain an artificial scarcity and keep cab prices up.

[bunderbunder]

I think a more likely explanation would be incumbents in the cab industry not wanting to see the value of their taxi medallions (for cab companies) or driver permits (for cab drivers) getting diluted. They both stand to maximize their profits if by limiting their competition. And at least for cab drivers, it's not too hard sympathize with them on that front.

But Uber does solve some real problems with traditional taxi service. In many cases it does a better job at solving the problems that might historically have been addressed by just having more cabs, such as it being difficult to get a ride at certain places/times. To that end it would be nice if more cities would allow regular taxi drivers and cab companies to get in on something like UberTAXI so that it can be a better solution for them as well.

[bpicolo]

200 taxis aren't going to line up for 1 person. That's not how capitalism will tell that tale.

[ithkuil]

I believe it's more likely that the reason is that scarce resources have a higher value/price.

The society regulating itself (read: taxi unions and politicians) recognizes that if the number of taxis weren't limited, the prices of the fare would go down, usually favouring people which are desperate enough to earn some money (read either young or immigrant). This would drastically reduce the wage of the non-immigrant french/american/italian citizen who has to provide for it's own family.

If the regulation would impose a minimum fare (in order to disallow competition among taxi drivers), there are still concerns that individual taxi drivers would have a bad time competing with taxi companies (with drivers that don't own the car or license).

[grimtrigger]

simple solutions: a gasoline tax or car tax. These are problems with cars, not just taxis/ubers.

[JonFish85]

I disagree--the problems mentioned were specifically cabs, not cars.

[stereo]

The licenses are limited in number, and re-sold. They’re seen by taxi drivers as a kind of life insurance. Talk about abolishing them or issuing more and, you guessed it, they’ll strike.

[dmix]

This is why regulation is more often bad than good. It always starts out with great intentions and often works well in the beginning, then crumbles over time either do to it's own bureaucracy, it's selective enforcement, or it's crippling effect on technology or markets.

In addition, it's always difficult to evolve the law with the times, or remove it entirely, than to create new ones. So we're left with an ever-growing legacy of non-productive policy.

[john_b]

In general market regulations start out with good intentions, but the protection they afford specific groups eventually tends to seen as a sacred right by those groups. Especially after the first generation--those who could still remember a time without that regulation--have passed on.

The type of regulations that can work well are those that benefit a large number of diverse groups (i.e. financial regulations preventing banks from doing stupid things with their customers' money) whose interests are so poorly correlated that they cannot effectively organize for a monopoly on some special privelege.

[mcguire]

"Why do the Paris cab drivers require such regulations?"

Historical and ongoing[1] abuse. The usual reason for regulations.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxicabs_of_Mexico#Security_Rec...

[icebraining]

That may indicate a need for regulations; I don't see how it validates such regulations, particularly the medallion system.

[mcguire]

You would think we would be swimming in discussions of the history of, say, the New York City medallion system. But the only thing I can find are links to a book that I may have to read, Graham Hodges’ Taxi! A social history of the New York City cab driver, and vague references to the Great Depression and strike violence.

"The competition 'was merciless,' according to Hodges, and 'Many cabbies turned to petty crime to help make ends meet.'

"There were strikes, and there were fare wars.

"Ultimately, an alderman named Lew Haas decided to do something about it.

"In 1937, he proposed a bill that would limit the number of taxis to 13,595, and make medallions automatically renewable, tradeable assets. It was signed that year by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia."[1]

"A 1934 strike turned violent, despite various promises of taxi drivers' associations to Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia that peace would prevail."[2]

"Until 1935, the taxi industry in New York was comprised of unregulated companies fighting for dominance. This all changed during the Great Depression. Widespread poverty prompted many New Yorkers to opt for less-expensive forms of transportation, decreasing the demand for taxis. This put many companies out of business and caused many cabdrivers to lose their jobs. The situation was made worse by the tactics of 'wildcat' (unlicensed) taxis who used what some considered to be 'underhanded tactics,' such as drastically lowering fares, to get more business."[3]

[1] http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/politics/2013/01/73990...

[2] http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=14414

[3] http://www.nyc.gov/html/media/totweb/taxioftomorrow_history_...

[darrylb42]

Paris, where the meter starts when you call the cab. After the second time with 40+ Euros on the meter we stopped calling cabs and flagged one on the street. Third trip we figured out walking was faster.

[saraid216]

> Third trip we figured out walking was faster.

Next time, you might try renting a bicycle. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%A9lib'