Say there's a bad law, for instance a law requiring that every toddler must be taken to a police station before the age of 3 to have one eye gouged out with a red hot steel bar.

Suddenly, the government decide to apply this law capriciously, and starts exempting left-handed boys from the eye gouging.

Would you complain that it's unfair that left-handed boys don't have their eyes gouged out? Would you say that two eyed people grow up to have an unfair advantage in the work place by being able to be more productive and earn more? Would that "fairness" be your concern? Would you feel better if the government reverted its policy and decided to apply the policy uniformly and resumed gouging the eyes of left-handed boy toddlers:

No! You would just want to make sure no one gets their eyes gouged out! Well there you go, focus your concern on the victims of the law, not on the lucky ones who manage to escape it.

My worst Uber experience is better than my best cab experience. I don't know anyone who's tried Uber here who would go back to using cabs except as a last resort. I don't understand why people would prefer a random almost untraceable taxi (Unless you memorize or document the license # of every driver, assuming it's even legit) over a known GPS tracked Uber. Perhaps things are different in other cities.

Does any other city have such a strict knowledge test as London? Certainly it's not common.

With that in mind, if you support the Knowledge requirement in London: do you think that other cities should have their own Knowledge? Or that London is a special case? Or do you think the Knowledge itself is too strict, but something like it is good? Or...?

Would you mind elaborating on the idea of sustainable pricing?

I ask because it sounds not too far away from, for example, "With the goal of artificially inflating the price of transportation, for the benefit cartel members, we will constrain the supply". See OPEC. This type of collusion is typically considered to be anti-competitive, and not in the best interest of society overall, or of the market counterparties. Silicon Valley's "No Hire List" conspiracy is another example of cartel action to manipulate market price for the cartel's benefit - in that case, illegal.

Why should the government support a specific type of private business (taxi companies) in this way? Competition is a good thing - we ought to encourage taxis and other transportation companies to compete with each other and offer the lowest price. I don't in general want my government to prop up businesses that cannot survive on their own (moral hazard, among other reasons), especially if society can solve the same problems with businesses that thrive naturally. To make this claim, there needs to be an objective way to define what a "sustainable price" is. Can such a thing be defined? (except as follows)

The fair market price is the sustainable price. Anything else is unsustainable and will only persist as long as artificial constraints are applied, such as arbitrary limitations on supply. This is not healthy, and harms the market and the consumer (deadweight loss). A functioning market balances supply and demand naturally through the negotiation of price.

Do other forms of transportation such as long-haul trucking or air travel require limitations on the number of trucks or planes in order for their markets to function effectively? It seems as though they don't. We expect airlines and trucking companies to compete with each other in order to offer the lowest price, and these days consumers select airlines largely on price. Why is regulation to artificially constrain supply necessary for taxis but not trucks or airlines?

It seems to me that such regulation is in fact not necessary, and not in the best interest of society; but is rather regulation that has resulted from "regulatory capture", and protects certain vested interests, at the expense of other transportation companies like Uber and Lyft, as well as the general consumer.

Surge pricing is a good thing, and if regulations prohibit it, then that's another example of undesirable regulatory intervention in a market. Surge pricing is another concept that's effectively standard and well-accepted in air travel: if you travel when it's busy, the fare will cost more. I discussed surge pricing in a previous comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8720969 The consumer protection issue of fixing taxi fares so that people don't get taken advantage of by unethical cabbies does not apply to Uber.

I am not sure about the insurance issue, but I agree that Uber ought to be required to provide whatever insurance is conventionally required by vehicles in that category. Perhaps that's taxis when comparing to UberX, and private towncars when comparing to Uber.

well, good luck, as i obviously didn't have enough luck to successfully use taxi when i tried even with a working phone :)

>To keep the price sustainable, cities limit the supply of taxis. In exchange taxis need to obey some rules (e.g. can't reject people).

And Santa Claus is real.

>It possible that the regulations are too strict,

who cares what regulations are if taxi service is that bad and thus the regulations are worthless? What happened with Uber (AirBNB/etc...) is the classical case from Hegelian dialectic - when situation gets that bad, that "badness" is a fertile soil from which a principally new solution emerges which fundamentally changes the situation - in western world such process is called "disruption". Attempts to reverse the situation after that is, like our Borg friends like to say, futile.

The "people", not being an individual or an AI or whatever, has a more complex preference vector than a ranked list. The real world is more complex than that.

So can we now agree that Arrow's Impossibility Theorem doesn't apply to all of democracy, that these things are nuanced and there is a long and deep conversation about this kind of topic that has been going on in the human race for centuries, and that frankly, pointing to technical flaws in established, stable enough systems that were set up by people with a hell of a lot less information about anything than us hundreds of years go is not going to do anything to prevent that system from operating in the way that it does or to convince people who have vested interests in it remaining stable?

That's basically what Arrow's impossibility theorem says. Due to its limited inputs, a preferential voting system will necessarily fail one of the three fairness criteria.

There are far better voting schemes out there, none of which are affected by Arrow's impossibility theorem.

[0]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_voting

Simply said, the fact that I can always get a taxi makes it more viable for me to not own a car. Less cars in a city mean more space and less traffic, both of which are desirable for the entire population of the city, and both of which have significantly more positive payoff than the cost of some minimum amount of taxis on the street at all times. Therefore, in my eyes, it makes sense to enforce such minimum via regulation, even though it is not profitable (and will manifest itself in an increased fare for other, more profitable rides).

Regarding the knowledge (yes, I know it's for black cab hails) - if you think that's useful, and are willing to pay the increased rates that result from the higher level of service (and as one who has taken London Cabs, I can attest it's a wonderful service, just not one I would be willing to pay for), then you should be free to pay for that service, in the same way that others should be free to provide and advertise it.

But don't make it a requirement to run a service like Uber/Lyft.

o Single Contact point - I don't have to power dial a bunch of different services, or try and find out who is currently picking up in my region.

o Always, Always, Always a driver available. There were so many times when I just could never get a pickup on the peninsula. With Uber/Lyft, no matter how busy it is, or what concerts are playing, I can always get a ride. 100% of the time. (And yes, I know surge pricing makes those rides pricey, but I would much rather pay 3x or 4x and have a ride in 5 minutes than spend an hour to 90 minutes waiting for a cab. )

o When the driver/dispatch claims they are on the way - they always show up. Not only do they always show up, they show up reasonably on time. And, better yet, I can see if they are moving in my direction. That real-time car location technology is a major innovation.

o The feedback mechanism means I haven't been picked up by one psycho, or in one half-broken down vehicle yet. I'm not claiming they haven't existed on Uber/Lyft, I'm certain they have. But, those types of drives will be downvoted so quickly they'll cease to be a driver very quickly. With Taxis, I had a ton of drivers on the peninsula I dreaded being picked up by. One of them was frequently undergoing some weird psychotic episodes which had him shouting out to voices. Another was just an asshole. I frequently got into old cars with non-working windows, and often doors that would not open from the inside.

o No screwing around having to "pay through an app" - you don't pay - you just book your ride and get out at your destination. Particularly when you have a bunch of bags and stuff - that's awesome.

These are just a few of the reasons why Uber/Lyft changed everything. I can't believe anybody who frequently took taxis on the Peninsula would claim otherwise. Price is about #7 or #8 on the list.

But, more importantly - how familiar are you with Taxi Drivers on the Peninsula. Many of them are very new to the valley, many of them have just started driving, and quite a few of them are scary, psychotic, or just plain mean. I have yet to have that experience with Uber/Lyft, and when I do, I expect my, and others feedback, to correct that situation immediately rather than have to deal with it for any prolonged period of time.

Also - think of the hundreds (thousands?) of people a day for the last 10 years who carpool over the bay bridge. In that situation, you truly are getting into an absolutely random strangers car. People don't seem to have any issues with that - and there is ZERO background check, tracking, or awareness of those people.

The world is not as scary as people seem to think it is - In terms of risks, the most dangerous thing is likely not your driver, but the fact that you are in a car in the first place. They kill 30,000+ people a year.

That would be revolutionary.

Which appointed agency would you rather have tell you what food is good/bad? The local health boards?! Don't make me laugh, I worked in a sit down restaurant for years and every single inspection was a quick walk through followed by a free meal we'd give the inspector and a high rating.

This wasn't one store. This is every single store I worked at in multiple restaurants across three different cities and two different health departments.

The term gypsy is widely considered derogatory, but it is also widely used and accepted as normal by people unaware of that.[1] I don't think it's fair to assume pico was using it as a smear, but in the ignorant casual sense that people refer to illegal cabs as gypsy cabs, or say they got "gypped". Still insensitive, but I don't think he was trying to use a slur.

I'm not trying to defend his usage. You're right, it's not okay. But I think there is a distinction to be made in educating someone as to the history of a word vs. assuming they used it intentionally.

[1] In Conan O'Brian's documentary, there's a scene where an attendee of his show says to him something like "we got jew'd", to which Conan says "you know I'm part Jewish, and my producer over there is Jewish?". And the guy says "sorry...we got gypped" and then everyone carries on like it's normal. Meanwhile I was like "wait, that doesn't bother you in the exact same way?".

That's not Uber's innovation, since livery cars are not allowed to accept hailed fares in most places anyway. The only difference is an app instead of traditional voice.

I don't understand your point about gypsies; "gypsy cab" is a pretty widely understood term for an illegal, unlicensed cab. At least, Uber seems to think so: http://blog.uber.com/2013/08/18/stay-safe-avoid-gypsy-cabs/

You either have a coherent definition of "will of the people" that goes beyond consensus, or you don't. If you do, give the definition.