By this logic, Facebook should be taxed to give money to Myspace.
Google should be taxed to give money to Yahoo.
Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
241–250 of 539 posts
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#242Obviously the logic is mystifying, but the math behind this is baffling as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxicabs_of_the_United_States#... says there are 1825 cabs in Boston. Boston is 10% of Massachusetts' population, so let's say there are 18k cabs in the state. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-massachusetts-uber-idUSKCN... says 5 cents/ride-hailing app will go toward taxis, and Uber+Lyft do 2.5m rider per m…
> there are 1825 cabs in Boston. Boston is 10% of Massachusetts' population, so let's say there are 18k cabs in the state. The number would likely be way lower than this (it doesn't make too much sense to extrapolate linearly from the densest urban population), but your point still stands even you double or triple the $/driver. That's pretty weird...
That's a good point. After Googling some more, it seems like MA has about 8300 "taxi drivers and chauffeurs" (http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes533041.htm), so the $83 should probably be doubled or tripled.
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can't keep going with this type of attitude; it's blatantly anti-change. The government's job is not to ensure that everyone has comfortable finances. The government's job is to provide a framework that makes it possible and a structure that removes nefarious actors. As long as that's occurring, the economy is self-governing, and we shouldn't be propping up legacy economic sectors just because we feel bad for the…
You write like your political view is a force of nature. Surely what the government's job is is what the people decide it is through democratic processes?
so mob rule? no. we are a constitutional republic
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can't keep going with this type of attitude; it's blatantly anti-change. The government's job is not to ensure that everyone has comfortable finances. The government's job is to provide a framework that makes it possible and a structure that removes nefarious actors. As long as that's occurring, the economy is self-governing, and we shouldn't be propping up legacy economic sectors just because we feel bad for the…
You write like your political view is a force of nature. Surely what the government's job is is what the people decide it is through democratic processes?
[deleted]
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can't keep going with this type of attitude; it's blatantly anti-change. The government's job is not to ensure that everyone has comfortable finances. The government's job is to provide a framework that makes it possible and a structure that removes nefarious actors. As long as that's occurring, the economy is self-governing, and we shouldn't be propping up legacy economic sectors just because we feel bad for the…
You write like your political view is a force of nature. Surely what the government's job is is what the people decide it is through democratic processes?
[deleted]
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#246This is a pretty surreal move: >The law says the money will help taxi businesses to adopt "new technologies and advanced service, safety and operational capabilities" and to support workforce development... [Larry Meister, manager of the Boston area's Independent Taxi Operator's Association] said the money could go toward improving a smartphone app his association has started using, or to other big needs. I'm not an…
I mostly agree with you, and I would have wholeheartedly agreed with you 2 weeks ago, but I just read a book ("Listen, Liberal" by Thomas Frank) that makes some interesting points about how liberals have shifted from representing working people to representing professionals, and to worshiping innovation. While free trade and disruptive technology is good for the professional class, it inherently increases inequality.…
Your comment literally reads like you're defending people who just want to be lazy and get paid as much as those who want to work.
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#247This is so weird. I'm not sure it's legal.
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#248There are two competing narratives about ride-hailing apps success: 1) They are profitable because they are finding loopholes in relevant legislation, or, 2) they are profitable because they are injecting competition and new ideas into a stagnating industry dominated by government-protected monopolies (or oligopolies). Your opinion of the law will likely depend on which narrative you find more persuasive.
> They are profitable
We have no evidence of this, and this is scary to me, for various reasons.
Uber/Lyft/et al are all about trying to gain a "lock" on the industry. If they succeed, they're going to hose me, badly. If they fail, they're going to leave a big crater behind from all the taxis they drove out of business.
Not friendly.
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#249Food for thought:
I am working on AI robot that will ultimately replace human programmers/coders/software engineers. It will make human programmers obsolete.
What will most of you do? Will you go back to school to get a new degree/profession? Open a coffee shop perhaps? or apply for peace corps?
It is coming.. just remember that eventually anyone could be the next "taxi cab" driver with his or her job going away to automation.
Our society will have no choice but to adopt in more ways than one.
Re: Massachusetts to tax ride-hailing apps, give the money to taxis
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
To this end, we should br taxing self driving cars to create a pension fund for taxi drivers. Taxing one cab company to pay another doesn't seem to address your listed concerns at all.
It's good to care about taxi drivers, but not because they are taxi drivers. Go back >200 years. In England, Spinning Jennies replaced weavers, and there were luddites who tried to resist, but the solution was not to start subsidizing weavers; and not even a specific tax to weaving machines to provide for the weavers specifically; the solution was to slowly build a social security system, and not just for master weav…
> putting a burden on something productive just because it is better
What aspect of Uber is better than a regular taxi? I can hail taxis from my phone just as well. They take me to the destination. I think Uber found a way to subsidize their fleet with drivers own cars and not pay some taxes to the state which the regular taxi drivers have to pay. Maybe I am missing something...