131–140 of 303 posts
I've definitely experienced this at DCA, and it's worth nothing as well that it sometimes take hours to get out of the airport due to the insane traffic jams right around the terminals and in the parking garages. DCA has gone from my favorite airport to literally my least favorite over the last year or so. I've been using Dulles instead even though it's way less convenient.
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There's probably a balance to be struck, because part of the ridesharing design's efficiency is that if demand drops they can drop their rates paid to drivers, and the drivers who don't want to drive at those prices will stop. So if Lyft starts to say "we always want X drivers available as a base load, and we'll open up to contractors to fill in the demand spikes" it might make the contractor role too unreliable for…
Can we please stop referring to these services as "sharing"? Lyft actually started as a company that coordinated the sharing of rides, i.e., no money was involved. But the "sharing" pretense has long since past for all of these companies.
Lyft isn't ride sharing because people aren't dividing up cars to rides, not because money is involved. Car2Go/Flexcar are car sharing. Carpooling is ride-sharing.
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Can we please stop referring to these services as "sharing"? Lyft actually started as a company that coordinated the sharing of rides, i.e., no money was involved. But the "sharing" pretense has long since past for all of these companies.
We need a new word for "taxi companies with cute apps, unsustainable pricing/wages and lots of Silicon Valley venture capital propping them up" to distinguish them from old-school taxi companies if we're gonna quit saying "rideshare". Any suggestions?
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Can we please stop referring to these services as "sharing"? Lyft actually started as a company that coordinated the sharing of rides, i.e., no money was involved. But the "sharing" pretense has long since past for all of these companies.
Right? It's nonsense. A grocery store isn't "food sharing", and a barber isn't "hair cut sharing". It's one party paying another for a product/service. Uber/Lyft's killer feature is the app pairing those two parties. But no one is "sharing".
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And suddenly Uber/Lyft are like any other Taxi company just with a massive valuation.
There's probably a balance to be struck, because part of the ridesharing design's efficiency is that if demand drops they can drop their rates paid to drivers, and the drivers who don't want to drive at those prices will stop. So if Lyft starts to say "we always want X drivers available as a base load, and we'll open up to contractors to fill in the demand spikes" it might make the contractor role too unreliable for…
I wonder if they will change the algorithm to just tell the drivers what they want to hear. To wit - Introduce a new multiplier for drivers based on their behavior. This will factor into the final price, but be obfuscated. Then Lyft can tell the drivers they are receiving a greater surge than what the rider sees, and pays.
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> I dont see how Lyft gets off calling this fraudulent. The workers are "defrauding" Capital out of greater-than-substance wages. It's bullshit, and they'll try to re-frame in in terms of customers, but that's essentially their view.
Well, Lyft drivers are supposed to be contractors, it's normal for contractors to set their rate so I don't see how this is fraudulent.
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Not exactly. The percentage that Lyft takes is the same, so Lyft actually makes more money from these price-hikes. The ones suffering are the passengers.
This assumes an inelastic demand curve. DCA has other options, such as taxis. (edited s/elastic/inelastic - I dun goofed. Thanks, Erik!)
That passengers suffer from a price surge does not assume an inelastic demand, or even a downward-sloping one. If you pay a higher price, you're suffering more, even if somehow it leads you to buy more of that thing.
I've definitely experienced this at DCA, and it's worth nothing as well that it sometimes take hours to get out of the airport due to the insane traffic jams right around the terminals and in the parking garages. DCA has gone from my favorite airport to literally my least favorite over the last year or so. I've been using Dulles instead even though it's way less convenient.
I’m trying to figure out how to define “way less convenient” in a way that has you choosing to use it instead. :-)
"On average, Lyft drivers earn over $20 per hour." I wonder if this figure takes into account all the waiting time, or just driving time on the app. If it is the latter, then that's a pretty scummy thing to say, considering that most drivers spend less than a third of the time actually driving people to their destination, putting the actual number closer to 7.00 an hour.
Also does that include repairs, depreciation, insurance etc. of the car? What about fuel?