Comment by dddgghhbbfblk
15 hours ago
As a blanket statement that's not true with NYC being the most obvious (but not the only) counterexample.
15 hours ago
As a blanket statement that's not true with NYC being the most obvious (but not the only) counterexample.
Do you commute to and from work every day by taxi in NYC
Early on in Uber's life, I went to a presentation they held where they showed there was a U shaped curve by income of who used Uber. Upper middle class people used them as discretionary entertainment vehicles but Uber had a substantial lower class population using them as necessary transport when working graveyard shifts in locations public transit didn't go.
So yes, there's a surprising contingent of people who commute to work every single working day using hire cars.
> Upper middle class people used them as discretionary entertainment vehicles but Uber had a substantial lower class population using them as necessary transport when working graveyard shifts in locations public transit didn't go.
This is information that suggests that Uber does not compete with public transit
4 replies →
Unless you're truly car sharing with a bunch of other people going the same way, I don't see how that makes sense. You have to wait for the car to arrive and you're paying a premium for it.
Most wouldn't because it's expensive. But at scale automated vehicles should be dramatically less expensive, in the range of 50-60¢/mi conservatively, and at that level it is going to be quite compelling to a lot of people since it's a private vehicle (no taxi driver) and it's reasonably affordable, a 1 seat ride, etc.
It's possible they'll be even cheaper but that range is the cost according to the IRS of operating a typical vehicle all in, and that seems like a reasonable guess of the cost of an autonomous electric vehicle with far lower probability of crash than a human (all the savings basically going to profit margin).
At ~60¢/mi, there'd be a lot of people who would save money on balance using autonomous taxis to get everywhere vs owning a private vehicle (10k mi/yr would cost only ~$6k/yr, a pretty low cost of ownership/use for a private vehicle).
I just calculated it for 40 cents per mi and just the basic commute to my company would cost already 40 euros.
But I calculated traveling 2 times a week, of course at the commute time everyone else commutes and public transport costs 50 Euros per month.
My company car though costs 200 Euros + 100 Euros energy.
Im pretty sure cybertaxi can't and will not provide 40 cents / mi in high demand times, for middle class paying more mone for the convinince of having your own car is still cheap and if i need to do anything further away like any trip, it will be expensive again.
And all of these cybertaxis have to live somewere.
The math doesn't make sense already.
First of all, some people do commute via ride hailing apps, yes. Second of all, transportation is a much bigger category than simply taking people to and from work.
To what extent by your estimation do taxis compete with public transit in New York City? The comment I was responding to said that New York City is obvious proof that taxis do, in fact, compete with public transit. That is what is being discussed here.
1 reply →