[bko]

> After waiting 20 minutes, I called the driver, who did not speak any version of English I am familiar with. He claimed to be relatively near my house but was unable to tell me how he was going to get there. I canceled and tried again. This time I got a young woman who also apparently didn’t speak English well.

As someone whose parents speak English with accents, it really makes me cringe when some Americans complain about non-native English speakers in service level jobs. I would hate to have one of my parents deemed less worthy of a job due to their accents. I understand that some jobs benefit greatly from employees that speak English fluently, but I don't think a driver is one of those positions and I doubt many would pay a premium to have a native speaker as a driver.

Maybe I'm overreacting but statements like the one quoted above always come off as slightly xenophobic. It almost makes me throw out the rest of the authors arguments as a rant.

[x0x0]

It's not xenophobic to want not to have so much difficulty that it interferes with the service. When you have a hard time communicating directions, it's a problem. Which is what this person experienced. Xenophobia is disliking of people, not disliking the inability to share directions.

[javery]

It is one big rant - as someone who has ridden with Uber dozens of times in 4 cities I have never had someone who I couldn't understand.

[baddox]

Ideally there would be no need to talk to your driver on the phone in order to find the car. I have only needed to in a tiny portion of my ridesharing trips. But if you do need to, I think it's very reasonable, and not xenophobic, to expect the driver to be able to communicate effectively with an average American (or resident of whatever region you're in).