Posted on 06/16/2018 1:33:43 PM PDT by Rome2000
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the president of Turkey, announced that he’s expelling Uber from Turkey, a result of pressure from Istanbul's taxi industry. Istanbul taxi drivers, numbering more than 17,000, claimed Uber was providing an illegal service and that it needs to be banned.
Ever since Uber began its service in Turkey in 2014, it's caused dissension among the country's taxi drivers, not unlike what's happening elsewhere.
In a speech on Friday, Erdogan said, “This thing called Uber emerged. That business is finished. That does not exist anymore. We have our taxi system.... Where does this come from? It is used in Europe, I do not care about that.... We will decide by ourselves.... No non-taxpayers can do business here.... It is our duty to remove this network, which works illegally in your field.”
Uber had no comment but had noted that 2,000 drivers use the service while another 5,000 work for UberXL, the service that uses vans and SUVs.
Istanbul’s taxi drivers have had a contentious relationship with Uber, taking them to court and accusing the company of hurting their business and operating illegally in the country.
Prime Minister Yıldırım said the taxi drivers should take responsibility for providing better services for users. He called on them to improve the conditions that led customers to prefer to use Uber.
Riders generally prefer Uber and its competitor Lyft to most taxi services because cars are available on demand within minutes, they're less expensive, offer a range of vehicles including SUVs, and allow a cashless transaction.
Turkey doesn’t do lawsuits.
I admit, but bad for the poor slob driving the car.
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Basically Uber turned a portion of our workers into rickshaw drivers, getting paid rickshaw wages.
Globalists want to drop the wages of the first world countries so they can compete with the third world.
Ban anyone from Turkey from emigrating to Europe.
And add posted by someone decrying communists yet supporting a syndicate/cartel that has held a a monopoly forever.
I think some people probably think the buggy whip manufacturers should have been compensated when cars became a thing
Personally uber, amazon, and a few other disruptive companies have increased my quality of life substantially
I really wonder at times if this is Free Republic or it is Big Givernment Republic. Many people beleive that they are owed a way of life and prosperity and they seem to equate that with freedom. They do not flinch at bringing government force down onto anyone who may infringe on their little slice of crony capitalism, government favoritism, or handout. The same people who claim they will die defending the 2A won’t hestitate to regulate the rest of us if it helps their personal situation. I’m not sure what they are defending.
Agreed
Less than 10 years ago i lost north of 7 figures on some bad investments (Took us a long time to accumulate that) and will take while to replace it and delay my retirement at least 10 years
Never asked or expected anyone to bail me out for my own misguided decisions
But I sure as hell learned from them
Why did Uber get the works?
That’s nobody’s business but the Turks.
LOL
Heard that song on 40’s on 4 on Sirius.
Back when music involved instruments and talent.
Yes. There still are quite a few cabs, but I hear they wish they were Uber drivers now, since we make life much more convenient for those who need rides.
So, I don’t understand why the traditional cab companies can’t simply function like Uber and have a nice app that makes it easy to get and pay for a cab.
Uber had no comment but had noted that 2,000 drivers use the service while another 5,000 work for UberXL, the service that uses vans and SUVs.
This is really going to cut down on the tourist trade, except among non-Turks who want their wives and daughters raped by hotel staff. Thanks Rome2000.
Yep.
That’s great.
In some rural parts of the country that didn’t even have ANY cabs before, this is now an option for people.
I can’t testify to the accuracy but I have been told that a NYC taxi medallion used to be worth upwards of $1 million, and now they are worth a small fraction of that?
In my part of the country, the idiot taxi commission forced all the cabs to trade-in their Crown Vics for Priuses. Which is all great and wonderful virtue signaling, but try taking your family home from the airport in one of those. Heck you can’t even really fit 2 adults with luggage in a Prius. Complete idiocy by the taxi commission. They helped crush the industry they were supposed to regulate and in theory protect from poachers.
Some cities have done that. See this link:
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-los-angeles-taxi-app-20150116-story.html
I can guess why it hasn’t been a huge success.
1) Lack of promotion - Uber and Lyft benefit from crowd sharing the concept and they spend a lot on marketing. Who markets/advertises for the Taxi app? Also notice the heavy hand of government in that article - cabbies who don’t use the app face $200/day fine! Sheesh! You cannot mandate success, you cannot expect a regulated bureaucracy to be competitive, and if each cab company servicing a different part of a city each uses their own app they basically have no efficiency to advertise or critical mass in size to become competitive with a global brand that recruits any person with a car and a license to their service.
2) Taxis generally cost more, using the city’s fare rate schedule. Uber charges whatever they want - sometimes more sometimes less. In theory this would be a supply/demand thing depending on time of day, demand for cars and drivers available. But since they are underwritten by billionaire investors they can underwrite a fare at a loss for competitive reasons.
3) The higher price of a cab is due in part because they are regulated. The cars have to be maintained properly, all safety features working, up to code, all permits paid, the driver is registered and fingerprinted etc. With Uber you get a little less certainty about all that (though there are never any guarantees either way, plenty of stories of felons and drunk drivers with taxi permits).
And that’s just off the top of my head. I feel badly for how taxi drivers have been screwed but see two sides. They have been screwed by the taxi commission but also by using the commission as a form of protectionism. This is in some ways a classic example of how regulation can destroy an industry, about how regulation inflated the cost of a service to generate revenues for the city and to protect those on the inside, and how it’s bureaucratic and noncompetitive nature prevented it from adapting to technology ultimately leading to a disruptive (you might even call it a “black market”) service.
As an aside, I live in a very anti-gun city of a “may issue” CCW state. We have millions of people in this city/county and only a few dozen CCW permits issued total. One time many many years ago I took long cab ride from the airport and got to talking politics with the cabbie. His taxi had a large decal the width of the rear window with the word “supervisor” (or similar word I forget exactly) in big block letters. I asked what that meant and turns out he was the drivers’ rep on the city taxi commission or something like that. Anyway we got to talking guns and (he shouldn’t have done this) he pulls a stainless steel S&W .357 Magnum out from under his seat. I ask how did he get a CCW, he said he doesn’t need one, that his taxi was his place of business and that he argued successfully that taxi drivers should be allowed to carry loaded just like any other business person can keep a loaded weapon in their place of business. He claimed this was the law that he lobbied for.
Makes me wonder if Uber drivers aren’t also afforded the same rights.
Long drive from Louisville to Istanbul.
In Florida we still have rights, don’t need a license to carry in our cars, and we can use our cell phones too while driving:
You may keep, with or without a license, a firearm in your “private conveyance”, otherwise known as a vehicle. Fl. Stat. s. 790.251(5) states “it is lawful and is not a violation of s. 790.01 for a person 18 years of age or older to possess a concealed firearm or other weapon for self-defense or other lawful purpose within the interior of a private conveyance, without a license, if the firearm or other weapon is securely encased or is otherwise not readily accessible for immediate use.”
The important, and most often misunderstood, parts of this provision are the phrases “securely encased” and “not readily accessible”.
“Securely encased” means in a glove compartment, whether or not locked; snapped in a holster; in a gun case, whether or not locked; in a zippered gun case; orin a closed box or container which requires a lid or cover to be opened for access. Fl. Stat. 790.001(17) (emphasis added).
An important note in the list underlined previously is that whatever you keep your gun in it must be closed but not necessarily locked. http://www.solerslacklaw.com/Criminal-Defense/Florida-Gun-Law.aspx
Medallions used to be up to 1.3 million, they were about 100K back when I drove in the late 80’s.
When I signed on to UBER, I don’t remember them even discussing carrying in the car, I might have missed that part though.
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