Uber/Lyft Controversies

The courts have failed us.

You know what? I’m okay with this.
More cheap helicopter rides plz.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15H8UJ9-8dA

And a CNN investigation found in April that at least 103 Uber drivers in the U.S. have been accused of sexual assault or abuse of passengers in the past four years.

Not to be contrary, but I’m curious what the similar numbers are for cabby’s in the US? I find it hard to believe that in the last 4 years no cabby has sexually assaulted any passengers. At least one has to have done it, but how do the numbers compare?

That’s an interesting question. I also wonder if the difficulty of getting a taxi license actually also provides a natural limit on these sorts of things as there are only so many of those to go around.

AFAIK, taxis in a handful of the largest American cities have very low rates of crime, probably due to strict licensing.

Taxis everywhere else here are awful, awful things to be avoided at all cost. They are also barely regulated (if at all), and likely have little real data associated with them. It would be hard to say how much crime they are involved in.

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My guess is that yellow cabs and other licensed/regulated cabs with street pickup have lower crime rates since they are mostly doing shorter trips. Harder to assault someone in a crowded city on a 20 block trip with pedestrians all around the cab in broad daylight. Compare that to a long trip at night where the driver can pull over into a secluded area.

Uber also removes an additional filter in that pretty much anyone with a driver’s license, a phone, and a car can just start up driving. To become a licensed cabbie at least requires a little bit more filtering that could keep out say, a registered sex offender.

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In New York, if a yellow cab driver breaks any rule, you can narc on them via the 311 app. The city follows up shockingly aggressively, hammers them with GPS data, etc… They’re on a tight leash.

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If they go to court to fight, you can “appear” in taxi court and testify over the phone.