[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-...