Other than maintaining liability insurance like any other driver, I don't see the need for any of these added protections. IMO consumers do not want to pay the cost of these protections and they should be able to make their own well-informed choices instead of being forced to buy them by the state.
The cynic in me thinks this is less about consumer protection and more about well-funded taxi lobbies which benefit from the regulatory capture.
Consumers by and large want to pay for these protections (at least they want everyone else to pay for them), which is why they elected MPs to implement them. If the general public perceived it unnecessary to pay for them, they could elect appropriate politicians to remove the added protections, but it is not up to a single company to decide “nah, not worth it” and break existing laws.
So, the free market proponents argue that in that case the consumers should be able to choose freely between the two options.
That's pretty much the crux here: should consumers have the ability to 'opt-out' from these protections or not?
My beef with that is that taxi's are seen as public transport and people expect a certain level of service rather than a free-for-all where one driver will be courteous and professional, the car clean and serviceable, the next will rip you off and be a jerk.
Uber takes care of this in part by using a feedback mechanism, but - Unfortunately for Uber - in Germany these things are a bit more organized than elsewhere and the German taxi system - in those cities where I have used it - is actually quite reasonably priced and the drivers are typically professional and the cars are clean and well maintained.
So from that point of view they don't add value, they just undercut the existing drivers by sidestepping the regulations. And that is unfair competition.
The solution is simple: Uber should certify their cars and drivers for the German market under the same rules as the rest of the drivers and taxi companies, then undercut them on price and overdeliver on service.
Well, part of the innovation with Uber is that they're able to deliver the same or better service without the regulatory cost. If the feedback mechanism functions as well or better than special licenses/health checks/knowledge tests/what have you, why not pass those cost savings of that innovation on to consumers?
The regulations sound good and all, but I can tell you from personal experience that Uber takes feedback very seriously whereas dispatcher companies and regulators couldn't care less about it and pretty much nothing's ever going to happen to a taxi driver that was rude to you or took a circuitous route.
> Well, part of the innovation with Uber is that they're able to deliver the same or better service without the regulatory cost.
What regulatory cost?
Professional liability insurance (which is mandatory for the transportation of people) and higher frequency car certification are not 'regulatory costs' they are costs that industry and government have arrived at as a reasonable compromise between the pull of the market and the ability of taxi service providers to make money whilst providing a safe and professional service to the customers.
Regulatory costs would be 'buy a permit at $1M' or something like that. I don't see that in this judgement, it is just about Uber totally ignoring the law.
> If the feedback mechanism functions as well or better than special licenses/health checks/knowledge tests/what have you, why not pass those cost savings of that innovation on to consumers?
I'm all for that. If after Uber complies with the law their margins are such that they can operate more efficiently they will own the market.
> The regulations sound good and all, but I can tell you from personal experience that Uber takes feedback very seriously whereas dispatcher companies and regulators couldn't care less about it and pretty much nothing's ever going to happen to a taxi driver that was rude to you or took a circuitous route.
I've never had a German taxi driver that was rude to me or that took a circuitous route. (I wished I could say the same for my hometown, Toronto, Bucharest, Rome or New York, the other places where I regularly used taxis).
My comments aren't meant to refer to the German situation in isolation.
In a lot of jurisdictions complying with some of the consumer protection laws is more expensive to the consumer than a feedback system alone while offering little to no additional benefit. Things like medallion laws, knowledge tests, etc. These laws will never get changed unless Uber breaks them and demonstrates that they are, in fact, unnecessary.
I'm not familiar with the German regulations and the article is light on details but if it's as simple as liability insurance and an extra car-checkup I doubt Uber would be opposing this so vehemently. They already provide commercial liability insurance to US drivers, for example.
> I'm not familiar with the German regulations and the article is light on details
Ah, ok, never mind me then.
It's hard to argue from assumption, but this is not the only article about this subject, there are many more and this case has been working its way upward for a while in this court and others.
Essentially the German authorities position is that Uber is operating an unlicensed taxi company. Uber is welcome to become licensed but refuses to do so, which allows it to compete with the existing taxi companies but without the associated costs.
The existing taxi companies feel that this is unfair and have brought suit, which the courts have now decided has enough merit to warrant an injunction.
Germany is not a direct democracy. Theoretically it could be that 100% of the constituents oppose these protections, but still elected MPs which support them. There are plenty of issues that are more important and more likely to influence one's vote than the price of taxis.
That's not true. Elements of direct democracy are for example available at the local level. Here in Hamburg the politics is supporting it. For example the mayor of Hamburg is openly supporting it:
I'm fairly sure that this is not possible to enforce via Volksentscheid. Its state legislation, so the details differ, but as far as I understand in most states the referendum can only decide over a proposed law. In some states a general guideline for the parliament can be decided over (Berlin, HH and Schleswig-Holstein) but those are only recommendations.
I'm not certain if it would be a valid course to create a law that forces the parliament (or rather the states representatives in the Bundesrat) to propose a law. That might create a legal problem: What if the proposed law gets changed or rejected in the Bundesrat etc. You're free to try, but I doubt that course of action will work.
Well, Uber argues the same way. They also tried to cite the german constitution and argue that the law is unjust and violates the constitution. If that's really their opinion then the right course of action would be to apply for a permission, get denied, fight in court. Then the law would be repealed. But you don't get to choose which laws apply to you, just or unjust. You can decide not to follow the law (for example in civil unrest) and then go to court and fight it, but you don't get to say "I consider that unjust, so the law does not apply to me".
You can decide not to follow the law (for example in civil unrest) and then go to court and fight it, but you don't get to say "I consider that unjust, so the law does not apply to me".
Civil unrest implies you decide not to follow the law, but in turn face the consequences - go to court, get fined, maybe imprisoned in the hope to show publicly that the laws that lead to the imprisonment are unjust, creating pressure to change the laws. It doesn't mean that you decide that the unjust laws just not apply to you and then get a free out of jail card.
Where did this come from? The requirement that you have to put yourself voluntary in jail or worst if the rules are aggressive enough is ridiculous. Civil unrest is when you are trying to solve larger societal problem through it. You are disadvantaged by doing it whether you turn yourself to law or not.
The difference against Uber is that they are not trying to solve some injustice or political problem. They are trying to get advantage over competition by ignoring the rules competition follows. It is just trying to get an advantage for themselves.
I can see the difference when the action is unseen, and you have to draw attention to it to go to court, but I don't see how it applies to a service done in public like Uber. Should they be suing themselves?
Well, they're now getting sued. The other option would have been to apply for a permit, get denied a permit, go to court. They chose not to but rather offer their service despite it being clearly in violation of the law. I feel no pity for them.
Sure, to some extend yes. But Ubers public line of defense is "this unfair law should not apply, have mercy with us." (which is incredibly whiny). Now if the CEO would say "I believe this is unfair and I'll go to prison for it.", that would gain some respect with me :)
Just because the government is elected democratically doesn't mean individual laws are just or reflect the will of the constituents.
There's no incentive for the government to side with the consumers on this issue since politicians profit through taxi medallions, political contributions from taxi companies, etc and it's not a big enough issue for anyone to change their votes.
I doubt that there's a lot of political contributions from taxi companies. The market is very different from the US - in Berlin the 7000 Taxis are mostly owned by companies having anywhere between 1 and a handful of cars. A medallion costs the administration fee and can be freely obtained, they're more or less unlimited.
Certainly, the cab owners are somewhat organized and have some influence, but the degree is much lower than that. Uber alone has more lobbying power.
This is such a key point that so many people are missing by getting caught up in "Europeean regulation = anti-innnovation" clichés. The German laws requiring adequate insurance and inspections are mostly reasonable consumer-protection regulations, and not nearly as protectionist as the taxi regulation in many US cities. It's actually a much more open and free market than in cities where Uber has had most of its success.
It's rare that one can't flag down a taxi on a busy street within a couple of minutes in Berlin, and they are almost without exception clean modern cars with courteous drivers. The MyTaxi app has already brought regular Berlin taxis up to par with Uber for the smartphone-inclined. https://de.mytaxi.com/
Then Uber's prospects in Berlin aren't that good anyway. Maybe that's why they're willing to be so patient and fight things out in court.
In US cities, the taxi companies are collecting monopoly profits and providing bad service. Their scam is protected from competition by strict nonsense regulations by local governments. The local governments support the taxi companies for bad reasons like corruption and ignorance. Uber is better because it is subject to competition and is not a monopoly.
In a city with functioning taxi competition, Uber's only advantage is its software, its brand, and its network. Local companies could easily compete very effectively against that.
The broader issue here is that Europe and especially Germany has a regulated market. The voters voted for that for generations.
It is not only taxi but all sorts of professions that have similar or even more restrictive laws.
For any given regulatory issue, there is a core group of self-interested voters or political donators who support the regulation, and everyone else who doesn't care much one way or the other. This results in lots of protectionist legislation and regulation even if the majority of people are neutral or mildly opposed.
The reigning CDU and also the in the past reigning SPD are well known for their protectionism and regulation.
If voters would not like that they would have voted the FDP.
This has nothing to do with corruption, but with Europe's and Germanies history back to the guilds [1] from the dark age.
The cynic in me thinks this is less about consumer protection and more about well-funded taxi lobbies which benefit from the regulatory capture.