The Results Are In for the Sharing Economy. They Are Ugly. (nytimes.com) 121
The coronavirus pandemic has gutted the so-called sharing economy. Its most valuable companies, which started the year by promising that they would soon become profitable, now say consumer demand has all but vanished. It is not likely to return anytime soon. From a report: In earnings reports this week, Uber and Lyft disclosed the depth of the financial damage. The companies said their ride-hailing businesses all but collapsed in March, the last month of the first quarter, as shelter-in-place orders spread through Europe and the United States. The red ink extends beyond ride hailing. The home-sharing company Airbnb, which investors valued at $31 billion, had planned to go public this year. Instead, the company has slashed costs and raised emergency funding, and on Tuesday it laid off 1,900 employees, about 25 percent of its staff. It also reduced its revenue forecast for this year to half of what it brought in last year. "While we know Airbnb's business will fully recover, the changes it will undergo are not temporary or short-lived," Brian Chesky, Airbnb's chief executive, wrote in a memo to employees.
Well not all of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
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I had $60 of free doordash on my credit card so finally decided to give it a try and ordered my standard selection from a local restaurant. After the discount coupon for new customer and ignoring the doordash tip my cost was still more than the normal amount I paid in store.
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More than that, the prices on the "menu" in their app are ridiculously marked up. A mexican place close by has gotten onto Doordash and buying through the app before any service charge or delivery fee each item is 40% more than on the menu in the restaurant.
Fuck that shit, I'll go drive my EV to get it and it will cost me less than a dollar, even including tire wear.
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the sharing part was never there. It was always just renting.
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I wonder if there is a word for it when somebody rents your time to do some work for them?
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Re: To some extent - lots of rules about you can't (Score:2)
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That's the reason for most regulations. Everyone hates bothersome regulations, so imagine how bad things have to be before people decide the bothersome regulations are the lesser of the evils?
It's amazing how terrible humans can be.
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Labeling it "sharing" was always dishonest though, since sharing implies jointly splitting the cost, which isn't happening. No one's Uber driver was on the way the way to wherever you wanted to go. It's c
Re:Well not all of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. "Sharing Economy" is not the right term. Better to call it the "Bypassing Regulations Economy".
Re:Well not all of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. "Sharing Economy" is not the right term. Better to call it the "Bypassing Regulations Economy".
And exploiting gig workers too.
Re:Well not all of them. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Except to get a job at a 9-to-5-type company.
So some folks decide to be "gig workers" -- consultants, contractors, part-time, etc. rather than getting the more traditional-type job.
How is that everyone's fault?
Why can't they take responsibility for their own lives?
Every other working-stiff has to be responible.
Why do "gig workers" get special treatment?
Oh, maybe your a Leftist/Statist/Authhoritarian and hate that people have choice?
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We've had food delivery services for decades in my town. Often with numerous part-time drivers.
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Year to Date (YTD) NASDAQ is up! (Score:2)
https://finance.yahoo.com/quot... [yahoo.com]^IXIC
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People can't buy stuff, so they might as well buy stocks.
AirBnB had 8000 some employees? (Score:5, Insightful)
"...AirBnB...has slashed costs and raised emergency funding, and on Tuesday it laid off 1,900 employees, about 25 percent of its staff...."
I'll be the first to admit I don't know a lot about AirBnB. But I can't fathom how a company that is essentially a matchmaking service for vacation rentals and vacationers could possibly need 8000 employees. That's a staggering number of employees. What on earth are they doing that they need that many folks on the payroll?
I'm really asking.
Re:AirBnB had 8000 some employees? (Score:5, Insightful)
Marketing, customer service, lobbying and/or bribing every city council on the planet to keep them from being taxed and regulated like hotels. Takes a lot of manpower.
Re: AirBnB had 8000 some employees? (Score:5, Informative)
So I would guess that it was a lot of people who did advertising and customer complaint handling and mediation. Obviously the actual website and platform designers and coders is probably only a few hundred folks (who probably are staying in the payroll)
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So I would guess that it was a lot of people who did advertising and customer complaint handling and mediation. Obviously the actual website and platform designers and coders is probably only a few hundred folks (who probably are staying in the payroll)
Not likely. Whenever companies want to save money it's the IT people that get cut first.
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Airbnb is well known to simply blow off complaints, so it can't be that.
In fact they are well known to terminate accounts of people who complain, and then delete their reviews.
Airbnb is evil, and must be destroyed.
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Creating listings. Unlike you and me who have to create their own listings, premium providers who list hundreds of properties on AirBNB just share some absic data with AirBNB and AirBNB employees or contractors manually create the listings.
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It's not the sharing economy (Score:4, Insightful)
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But someone was hoping to get credit for coining a new phrase!
Good grief, "sharing economy" is such a really dumb word pairing. It sounds like something that belongs in a 1960s hippie commune.
Re:It's not the sharing economy (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the point, to make it sound fluffy and loving. It sounds a lot better than the Voluntary Servitude Economy.
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If someone is "sharing" something with me, I don't generally expect to be paying for it.
"Here, want half my cookie? Great! Oh, that'll be $1.25 please..."
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If someone is "sharing" something with me, I don't generally expect to be paying for it.
If you and your buddy are taking a road trip to somewhere, do you also not pay for half the gas? Or do you expect them to schlep you around for free? I mean, that's what Uber was supposed to be: A way to share rides. (I'm not saying that what it is, btw.)
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If you and your buddy are taking a road trip to somewhere, do you also not pay for half the gas?
That's a valid point. Although, back in my single days, it seemed to always be my car making the trip and my buddies would manage to "forget" to help me with the gas money, most of the time.
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So where would Uber of Lyft fit in with that? The driver probably wasn't going where you want to go and you'll be paying for all of the gas plus the driver's time and a bit for the company. Basically it's a less expensive taxi without the (minimal) accountability, it's not sharing.
Is it really Voluntary (Score:2, Troll)
Re:It's not the sharing economy (Score:5, Interesting)
Back in my day we called them 1099 employees or Independent Contractors.
But to be fair back in my day, 1099 employees did high skill high paid jobs. where the risk of not getting your next job for a month or two and the fact you need to pay for your own benefits is balanced by the fact that you are getting paid 3-5x more than the normal employee who does the same work.
Good. (Score:5, Insightful)
The sharing/gig economy is just a relatively small group of employers that exploit loopholes in labor laws, its existence is a regulatory and/or labor policy failure. Between this, the fossil fuel industry tanking, attempts at UBI-like schemes, and some minimum wage increases around the world, this pandemic could leave us with a much better world for the working classes!
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This is the system working as intended: Demand drops and these companies cut costs along with it. Unfortunately, a lot of Lyft and Uber drivers factored gig requirements and income into their purchase and are stuck with cars they can't afford. I suspect the same is true of Air B&B owners, though I have a lot less sympathy for them. (I've seen some offering their places free for hospital workers--I cynically assume this is for tax purposes.)
For consumers, the main downside of this is that the middlemen
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In the rideshare world, the ride does not start charging until the driver is withing 2 minutes of the passenger pickup point, AND/OR the driver waits for five minutes to pick up the passenger. Should the passenger cancel or not show up at this point, they are charged $5. Lyft pas
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Your assumption was incorrect, AirBnB hosts don't get any sort of tax break. They're just not having to pay taxes for that time period since they don't have any income, but they still have to pay mortgage, utilities, property tax and the like whether they're making any money on it or not. My wife rents our cottage through AirBnB when we're not using it (it's out in the middle of nowhere, so we haven't offered it to healthcare workers), she's shut it down for now. When it's time to pay our taxes next year
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Perhaps the cost of cleaning after they left (we don't pay a cleaner, but some hosts do), and any consumables (TP, shampoo, and the like) could be deducted from the host's income for the year, but that would be about it. Maybe utilities above the normal base bills incurred when the house is empty. Corporations can claim missed opportunity costs (at least they used to be able to, I assume they still can), but landlords can't. As far as the IRS is concerned it's the same as if we let our niece's family sta
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Re:Good. (Score:5, Insightful)
There often isn't even any loophole though, they just say "but on a computer!" and ignore the laws.
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FTFY. With the exception of the investors in those companies, it makes everyone's lives better. Even the wealthy benefit from a healthy economy.
Hell, even most of the investors in Uber, Lyft, and AirBnB are diversified enough that they probably are going to do well. It's only the founders who are going to be stuck with all t
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Between this, the fossil fuel industry tanking, attempts at UBI-like schemes, and some minimum wage increases around the world, this pandemic could leave us with a much better world for the working classes!
That's dubious and full of wishful thinking. The reality is that a lot of businesses are going to die off due to the pandemic and that ultimately hurts workers. Fewer jobs and less competition for labor decreases its value. It doesn't matter what you set the minimum wage at if no one can afford to hire workers because their own customers are having problems and buying a lot less. A UBI only works when you have a strong economy because if 25% of the people aren't working, you have to take a lot more from the
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The Gig Economy is a loophole in labor laws. Jobs require minimum wage, and some of these jobs will also have a period of down time, which the company still needs to pay the employee. The Gig Economy is paying workers for only the time they are making profitable actions. Not administrative work, or even driving to a high demand area.
Oil prices is a temporary problem. Enjoy it while you can, but it would be stupid to use the current prices to determine that I am going to buy a F-450 Pickup Truck figuring
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The Gig Economy is a loophole in labor laws. Jobs require minimum wage, and some of these jobs will also have a period of down time, which the company still needs to pay the employee. The Gig Economy is paying workers for only the time they are making profitable actions. Not administrative work, or even driving to a high demand area.
Construction work is often like that. You only get paid when you work. If a snowstorm prevents working, no one gets paid that day. You need to get to the jobsite on your own, often provide your own tools, etc.
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Around here, if you showed up for work, you were supposed to be paid for 4 hours even if nothing for you to do. This may have changed in the race to the bottom.
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The working class is getting hit the worse from this. Because of supply and demand. Working Class people are easy to replace, While their job is necessary for the company the employee is not.
Working class are despised by the 1% as well as by colleges. The goal is to flood the market with compliant illegals and drive them down to third world conditions by importing the third world here. Open borders is the ultimate example of privatize the gains while socializing the loss.
it was NEVER sharing (Score:5, Insightful)
when I share, I give.
It was nothing less than dishonest, "feel good" marketing to call it that.
What amazes me is how people swallowed it.
What are the bad news? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What are the bad news? (Score:5, Interesting)
1000% in agreement here. AirBnB is a nightmare for renters and neighbours to the units and they can go get completely fucked. With 8000 employees, maybe they could figure out a way to make sure that people are only sharing their one-and-only primary residence, rather than encouraging people to rent 20 units and sublet them all and do not a single goddamn thing about it.
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Indeed, with short-term lets drying up due to Covid-19 it has become clear that there were a lot of people were operating property portfolios as a business [boingboing.net] under AirBnB. So much for the "sharing economy".
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No UGLIER than any service business with groups (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not just the "sharing economy." It's restaurants, gyms, Yoga/Pilates studios, churches, schools, movie theaters, etc. Pretty much any business that has a personal touch or groups of people packed together is in the same boat.
Taxi drivers are suffering as much as Uber/Lyft drivers.
AirBNB can provide you a virus free exclusive use suite by cleaning and then leaving it empty for 72 hours *once* people are again allowed to travel. So they should bounce back somewhat. AirBNB is going to lose a lot non-exclusive shared bedroom business though.
Jumping into someone else's car or taxi or public transit if you have another option? That's not going to be very popular for while except to the narrow slice of people who believe the plandemic disinformation.
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Well, what about when the bars and restaurants open back up?
Safer to drink and drive vs the norm now of drinking and Ubering back and forth and leaving the cat at home?
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I walk or crash at a friends house close by. Why would I take an Uber just to drink?
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Either you're a college student drinking near campus, or somewhere extremely small or something very densely packed urban type.
There's a MUCH larger world out there my friend, where people live spread out, with "breathing" room....and they might want to go to a new place across town that is happening.
Not everyone lives stacked on top of each other like a box of hamsters.
Hell, until I discovered Costco delivery here in th
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There are urban areas where you can have a house and yard and still walk to a bar. Maybe not NYC, but in most cities. I've never really felt the need to go across town to the hot new bar, but if I was I could see taking PT or walking back.
I will admit that most people don't like walking as much as I do.
That said, I usually drive to the shop because, well, walking with bags sucks. Also, maybe it's just better zoning, but there seem to be enough bars/restaurants that everyone can walk to some. They are c
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Safer to drink and drive vs the norm now of drinking and Ubering back and forth and leaving the cat at home?
If you Uber, how can you tell if your cat is alive or dead? Think of the kittens, people!
Post-capitalism (Score:1)
So, the "sharing" economy is in terrible shape, but Uber stock price is above its 6 month average.
The disconnect between the state of the economy and the state of the stock market is the mask dropping off the fraud that our economic system has been since the days of trickle-down Reaganomics. 15% unemployment with the worst 1 month unemployment, 35 million people out of work, another 6 million who have permanently left the job market in the past few months, but the stock market is booming and the NASDAQ at
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but the stock market is booming
S&P 500 down around 400 points since the start of the COVID scare, and DOW is down around 5,000 points.
and the NASDAQ at highs for the year.
NASDAQ high for 2020: 9817. Currently sits at 9090.
I'm constantly amazed by people that take the time to post 100% incorrect information that can be looked up in ten seconds.
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While your points are correct,
1) Talking about the DOW is silly, given its non-market-cap calculation
2) Talking about "points" is silly, just like talking about stock prices in price/share change. Talk in percentages.
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1) Talking about the DOW is silly, given its non-market-cap calculation
Go complain to PopeRatzo, not me. I didn't bring up the DOW, and made no comment about whether or not it is a good metric for anything.
2) Talking about "points" is silly, just like talking about stock prices in price/share change. Talk in percentages.
Irrelevant. PopeRatzo declared that the stock market is up, up, up ! (positive percentage). The fact is that they are down, down, down (negative percentage). If you want to go calculate percentages, be my guest, but it had nothing to do with his original statement or my rebuttal.
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Just FYI:
But you did say:
Useless scales are misleading. It's like saying someone lost a 100 trillion Zimbabwean dollar dollars (40 cents USD). If the market was was only down 0.0001% it's pointless to say it's down (or up). Few people actually knowledgable in the market would talk about index "points".
And just FYI, what PopeRatzo
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More correctly said, the NASDAQ is "up for the year" since it's higher today than it was at the beginning of the year.
https://www.marketwatch.com/st... [marketwatch.com]
Oh, SO close to profit! (Score:2)
Its most valuable companies, which started the year by promising that they would soon become profitable, now say consumer demand has all but vanished.
Please, most of them had no path to profitability. They'll just use the COVID scare as a cover for their poor business model.
The SHARING economy? (Score:2)
That sounds like COMMUNISM! /sarcasm
Will it stay like that though? (Score:2)
Basically any business that involves consumers consuming (discretionary retail, restaurants, travel, airlines, etc.) has ugly results now. I assume a lot of the in-bad-shape retailers like Sears and JCPenney will get totally killed because of this. It's a very good lesson on how dependent the entire US economy is on consumer spending. From an economist's standpoint, this is pretty much the only time they'll be able to research the knock-on effects of what happens when people are only buying what they need.
A
Ha ha (Score:2)
That is all.
This is what happens when (Score:2)
Your business model is based on convenience and not necessity.
Good (Score:2)
The "sharing" economy was never about sharing. It was about abusing the most vulnerable of its members by those that already have everything. The sooner it dies the better for all of us, it's at least one race to the bottom that's over.
Re:UGH.... (Score:5, Insightful)
OTOH, I hate UBER. The last one I took, the driver had no idea where I wanted to go. He refused to accept directions from me and then wanted to charge me for going nowhere. UBER can die for all I care.
Re:UGH.... (Score:5, Informative)
We must live in very different places.
What you described was many of my cab rides prior to the uber/lyft era.
With uber/lift, they have the app which tells them the right way to go 99% of the time in my experience....they usually are nicer, vehicles are much cleaner and the rates are MUCH more reasonable.
Also, with the app, you get pickup quick and easy without having to call the cab dispatch service...and it is MUCH easier to get your phone out and uber home after a night of drinking....hence the trend downward for DWIs and the like since we got ride sharing prevalent in our society.
Hell, since it came out....these days I NEVER go anywhere if there's a chance I'd have a drink....door to door with uber, I don't even have to consider whether I'd have a drink (or 8) out anymore and if it would be worth the risk of getting caught.
Re:UGH.... (Score:4, Informative)
I tried for the first time to hail a Lyft about a year ago in Milwaukee to get to the airport. I arranged for a pickup in plenty of time, yet I got no responses. The Lyft app helpfully showed all of the Lyft cars around the area that weren't on their way to pick me up. When I was about out of time to get to the airport, I called Yellow Cab. Five minutes later, I was on my way.
Of course, one can say that since I didn't have a rating, drivers would be loathe to pick up a new Lyft user. Yellow Cab didn't have a rating for me either. The fare was perfectly reasonable too. And I learned a lot about Milwaukee from a guy who's seen a lot. Lyft will never get a dime of my money, and neither will Uber. As for Airbnb, I'd rather sleep in a tent.
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Never had a problem ever with Uber.
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I live in a rural area where there are no taxis. I was stranded recently and 10 minutes after installing the Uber app, I had a ride. Since I've never used a taxi, I don't know how the price compares, but I was very impressed. I've also used AirBnB a few times with good results.
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Taxis and Uber/Lyft are both expensive for what they do. As such, people use taxis as infrequently as they can, and they certainly don't use it for commuting. And yet for some bizarre reason I see people using Uber for their normal commute, sometimes taking it a measly two blocks to the train station (I am not making this up and the person is in fit shape). And the people using it are not always rich, so I suspect that they assume that if there's leftover money at the end of the month that they need to s
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Getting a cab at the airport is simple and easy. Frequently easier than finding your Uber/Lyft. Same story about getting a taxi from a major hotel. Nice line of taxis ready to take you where you want to go. Unfortunately for taxis, that's pretty much the end of where they might win vs. Uber/Lyft.
Rarely is the taxi as nice as Uber/Lyft vehicles. There is also the problem of needing cash or trusting that your credit card data isn't going to be stolen by the cabbie (or that they will even take a CC). Don't for
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But to use Uber, you have to put your credit card into the phone. That violates one of my security rules.
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With a taxi service, it's their full time job, they can't just ignore customers and keep the job. They don't need mutual good ratings, they only need the driver to have a good rating. Imagine going to a restaurant and being refused service because your tips were lower on average than the people in line behind you. Uber still wants to maintain the fiction that their employees are not employees and so they're allowed to ignore your request.
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Remember, it's NOT ride sharing. It's a taxi service by another name and business model. Ride sharing is when you and someone else are going in the same direction and decide to take just one car. Uber drivers are not saying "oh ya, I'm going to coincidentally be riding past your work so I can drop you off, for free!" Uber drivers are identical to taxi drivers, sitting around waiting for an incoming dispatch; by phone instead of radio (oh wait, phones are radios too!). Maybe they have a side gig doing Ub
Re: UGH.... (Score:2)
Indeed.
And exactly can be said for AirBnB.
People buy houses for the sole purpose of making them available via AirBnB.
They are motels in everything but name. And do more damage to the economy than Uber
Re: UGH.... (Score:2)
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Who cares?
It works, is better priced and overall better experience for the person needing the ride.
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Don't trust these people. There is no way you're going to get in an Uber and they don't know where you are going unless they are a former Taxi driver. The app shows them where you are going once you pick them up. Just request a new Uber and wait 2 damn minutes.
You're making the false assumption that all of them have a high enough IQ to follow directions. I have had two drivers in the last 12 months that drove in the wrong direction for over 10 minutes while both the GPS and myself were telling them that they were not going the right way. I've also had several drivers cancel pickups because they can't figure out how to get to me (they literally drive around my block multiple times while I am standing there waving at them trying to get their attention). All said
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Cabs are only struggling worse — you just don't hear about it from NYTimes, because cab-companies tend to be local and small.
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How often did you use them? I've used them in the US maybe 3 times in my life. Even in a vacation in NYC I used the subway and bus.
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You'll manage.
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...I hate to hear that.
I HATE cabs......
Good Lord, why would anyone mod THIS comment down to zero? Have cabbies become some kind of holy icon at Slashdot or something?
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My confusion is that people think Ubers and cabs are different things, and that Uber drivers and cab drivers are not the same thing? It's really odd.
Really, the only difference I can tell is that cab drivers have to carry commercial insurance while Uber drivers usually carry insurance that will refuse all claims when driving for commercial purposes. But yeah, that's it.
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