By Don McCurdy
Two interesting reports regarding independent contractor status are in the news of late, one from Gloucester, Massachusetts and the other from Las Vegas, Nevada. In Gloucester, former drivers are suing the taxicab company claiming employee status. In Las Vegas, drivers are close to being offered an opportunity to lease cabs as independent contractors rather than as employees.
Just a refresher, drivers in Nevada are considered employees of taxicab companies and have unions. Since there are a multitude of taxicab drivers across the country who would jump at the chance to be employees with the benefits Las Vegas taxicab drivers have, it will be interesting to see if drivers avail themselves of the "opportunity" to be independent contractor lease drivers.
Were there a chance to be owner operators with a Las Vegas permit of their own the idea might be attractive, but short of that I see little attraction. Gloucester appears to be another case of how much control was exerted over the drivers with a large enough group complaining for it to be a class action suit. No doubt certain bankruptcy if the company is ruled against.
Anyone who has ridden in a New York City taxicab is familiar with the partition between the driver and the passenger, designed to protect the driver from the effects of global warming. Oh, yeah, not global warming but robbery and assault, even though there are those who believe global warming is way more dangerous.
Regardless, it seems that most of the vehicles with the partitions have never been crash tested despite the Taxi and Limousine Commission rule that was supposed to go into effect in December of 2015. According to the report, the compliance with the new rule was so low that they put the deadline off until December of 2016.
Now, since the impetus for regulation is claimed to be the safety of the riding public, it would seem that a rule created in 2013 with a 2015 deadline would be ample enough time to make sure the riding public is in fact safe. However, it has been put off despite the obvious danger to the public.
There has been no comment from Mayor de Blasio's office regarding the suggestions that the delay is a reward to he mayor's taxi medallion donors to the detriment of the riding public. I wouldn't say anything either.
Reports out of Philadelphia are that taxicab drivers are protesting UberX and Lyft. Yeah, okay, the usual. What gives the story a different flavor is that Uber Black drivers are also protesting UberX and Lyft. Of course, the taxicab drivers are complaining, but Uber Black drivers aren't usually involved in protests about Uber.
According to the complaining drivers UberX, Uber and Lyft are operating in violation of the law. Uber? In violation of the law? I thought Uber was German for in violation of the law? Okay, maybe not, but they've been skirting the regulatory rules since inception. Why are their own drivers surprised? I have long said that cities regulate the willing and Uber just hasn't been willing.
I'm part of the union, or so the song goes. Seattle has passed an ordinance that says the drivers for Uber, Lyft and taxicabs are allowed to unionize. The interesting part of the story was the comment by the writer that this was the first time "contract" drivers were allowed to unionize. Huh? If they're "contract" drivers they would be independent contractors which is why some "unions" are called an "alliance" rather than a union.
Rather than a protracted, expensive lawsuit, wouldn't it have been easier to just say that any transportation services doing business in the city must use employee drivers? Give them a transition period and voila, they're eligible for unionization.
Now we get courts taking the issue under advisement and protracting the entire affair. Sounds like a make work project for attorneys. You also have to wonder if the city is ready to raise taxicab fares to cover the cost of employee drivers or if they're just expecting the companies to suck it up and deal with it.
Uber can charge whatever, but cab fares are a different matter. Uber has pulled out of other markets when regulations got too onerous. Perhaps, this is a market they will abandon. If so, the victory gained will not help the Uber drivers, but it sure will help the taxicab drivers. That said, how it affects the riding population could be an entirely different issue.
Both taxicabs and "ride sharing" companies claim that all they want is a level playing field. Okay, got that. Well, the Honolulu city council is discussing just regulating Uber et al as taxicabs. What? Not that level a playing field.
Honolulu has long had an open system where all you have to do is get a $50 permit and you're a taxicab. The driver has to jump through some hoops to get a license but the entire process is very open. Well that's just not "level" enough for Uber. While Uber does pretty much exactly what a taxicab does, Uber claims a big difference because it doesn't own cabs. That's pretty much how the entire Honolulu market is with taxicabs.
Honolulu has more of a dispatch center philosophy which is exactly what Uber claims to be. Uber would like for us to believe that it's a "technology company," and has nothing to do with ground transportation. That really isn't the case though because they vet drivers, train them to use the system, have standards of performance, feedback from customers and as an end result ground transportation is provided. Those all sound like what the city of Honolulu calls a taxicab.
I did like the cheap shot quote attributed to an Uber driver regarding taxicab experiences he's heard about. He didn't mention any of the allegations against Uber drivers though, I guess that wouldn't have been level.
Nebraska regulators have decided that multi-loading of Medicaid passengers without their permission is no longer acceptable. The commission ruled that the fare paying passenger and the first passenger are considered the same. Really? How so? A person that pays the fare is the fare paying person. A person who rides while someone else is paying the fare is not the fare paying person. How hard is that to understand? But, that's government.
In my experience, these types of trips are flat rates bid on a contract basis, not full meter. The driver got fairly compensated by multi-loading. Some trips would have been less than a third of the actual meter if the driver were to run them individually. Their decision is their prerogative, but the larger amount it will cost is not theirs, it's the taxpayers.
A recent opinion piece out of New York City pointed up the new issues facing the transportation industry in NYC, up to and including the loss of medallion value due to the Uber uprising. By accepting Uber as something other than a taxicab service the city has degraded the value of the medallion. That parts obvious, but it has also hampered the green taxi and wheelchair accessible taxi.
By allowing a considerably less regulated competitor the city has diminished the ability of the green and wheelchair advocacy groups to get what they want. The interesting claim of the piece was that if you wanted a green or wheelchair friendly vehicle you can simply reject the first car it offers after seeing its attributes and take one that suits you.
Since Uber claims itself a "technology company" rather than a transportation provider they don't have to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. As such getting a wheelchair friendly vehicle may continue to a pipe dream. Since Uber is all about using personal cars I wonder how many of those cars will be wheelchair accessible?
It's being reported that the Yellow Cab Company of San Francisco, Uber's home town, is filing for bankruptcy. Along with competition from Uber, Lyft et al they lost an $8,000,000 lawsuit for a collision in which a passenger was injured. Now, I understand that Uber is not a taxicab company, but will its insurance withstand such a claim? Since they have billions the likelihood of such a suit is absolute. They will be sued. I hope they're prepared.
The city of Chicago is reported to have selected two of eleven phone aps that every driver "must" use while on duty. Must use? So the city now determines which dispatch method a driver must use to further his/her business? I get the idea that the city government wants to help taxicab drivers compete with Uber. How about this, get off their backs. The solution to the high cost of regulation is more regulation?
These services make their money by selling trips for a piece of the action. So, besides the taxicab driver who is going to pay? It always amazes me how government seeks to repair a problem they created with more "creativity." Why not let the drivers decide which service to use? Since one of the services already had 4,000 drivers without government interference why tamper with it?
If you have any comments regarding this or any of my articles please feel free to contact me at don@mcacres.com.
—dmc
