# The future for drivers



## luckytown (Feb 11, 2016)

When self driving cars come...what does it mean for drivers....will the government say we cant drive cars anymore....will we still be able to buy cars...from car manufactures........what is the plan??????


----------



## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

luckytown said:


> When self driving cars come...what does it mean for drivers....will the government say we cant drive cars anymore....will we still be able to buy cars...from car manufactures........what is the plan??????


By the time the government is capable of implementing a plan of this magnitude, you & I will likely be to friggin' old to drive anyway.


----------



## luckytown (Feb 11, 2016)

Uber's Guber said:


> By the time the government is capable of implementing a plan of this magnitude, you & I will likely be to friggin' old to drive anyway.


So SDC will probably replace buses because rates will be so cheep.....but for a while drivers will still share the road with bots


----------



## steveK2016 (Jul 31, 2016)

Until the day that SDC is 100% human intervention free, it will never be allowed for commercial transportation. There will be too many incidences where human intervention will be illegal, such as almost all pickups past 10pm. 

The testing ground to refine SDC will be in personal vehicles because then I can have autopilot take me to work but i can intervene even if its 95% good.

Then you'll have a conundrum. If my car is 100% human intervention free, and i already own an SDC, why wouldn't I just have my car drive me to the bar? Why would I need to pay extra to have an Uber SDC take me?


----------



## Grahamcracker (Nov 2, 2016)

luckytown said:


> what does it mean for drivers.


Find a different job. I would start looking now. Use Uber/Lyft as a crutch only. Rideshare isn't a good long term solution.


luckytown said:


> will the government say we cant drive cars anymore


That's the rideshare companies vision.


luckytown said:


> will we still be able to buy cars


Not sure



luckytown said:


> what is the plan


To replace driver's with drones?


----------



## bpm45 (May 22, 2017)

Until they get better maps and routing logic. It's a ways off. I can't wait to see self driving cars try to navigate alleys given the frequency of alley pickup/dropoff locations and their attempts to take shortcuts through alleys I see in Chicago every day.

A bigger impact on drivers will be the rapid rise of rental bikes like JUMP and the scooters.


----------



## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

The future:

Uber and Waymo and Didi and other companies lobby and push legislation thru legalizing SDCs.

A few states allow them to drive 100% human free. After a short time the companies brag about how many millions of miles their cars have travelled, accident free.

Cars are legalized for transporting humans and cargo. Drivers panic as pay rates are cut in half or more. Most drivers quit. In an effort to convert all rides to SDCs, companies deactivate any driver as soon as they get a single major complaint, in the states where SDCs are legal.

States panic as they realize that 60% of drivers really do drive full time, not 10% as the companies claim. Waves of unemployment claims overwhelm those states, which try to figure out how to actually enforce them against companies that said we were all ICs.

Then the real problems start... cars getting wrong driveways, addresses. Cars not stopping for fire trucks or following construction workers detours. Cars not merging properly, slamming on brakes randomly, causing accidents. Drunks vandalizing cars.

Injuries occur. A dog gets killed. Then another homeless person. Then a congressman's child. Rapists drug women, order cars with the woman's phone, and rape them on the ride, and never get caught.

Lawyers look to point blame, then realize (too late) that the legislation that was pushed thru somehow indemnified the companies. Everyone asks how could this have happened?

A pissed off ex-driver who lost their home to bankruptcy orders a car and sends a homemade bomb to Uber HQ, killing more innocent pedestrians than Uber employees.

States slam the brakes on SDCs, demanding them to stop being used. Too bad the human drivers have all been fired or quit. Driver re-signing bonuses reach the $5,000 level, even as drivers are only earning .25 per mile. People sign up just to get the bonus, then quit. Drivers tell pax that they will only give rides if they are paid extra cash up front.

End of Chapter Two (we are still living chapter one)


----------



## Drivincrazy (Feb 14, 2016)

Chapter 3: we all can drive independent of U/L...we must show our insurance coverage documents to pax plus have required business licenses, etc. We are freed from the grips of U & L. Could happen.


----------



## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

Drivincrazy said:


> Chapter 3: we all can drive independent of U/L...we must show our insurance coverage documents to pax plus have required business licenses, etc. We are freed from the grips of U & L. Could happen.


It's possible in Orlandoish,

I used to do it back in the day. The legal framework existed and still exists. People still do it here. (but i see uber/lyft stickers on these cars as well)


----------



## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

luckytown said:


> When self driving cars come...what does it mean for drivers....will the government say we cant drive cars anymore....will we still be able to buy cars...from car manufactures........what is the plan??????


" Its the End of the World as we Know it "!- R.E.M.



luckytown said:


> When self driving cars come...what does it mean for drivers....will the government say we cant drive cars anymore....will we still be able to buy cars...from car manufactures........what is the plan??????


FIRE THE DAMN GOVERNMENT !

FREE WILL

USE IT


----------



## Retired Senior (Sep 12, 2016)

I must have said it at least 20 times already. There is a strong probability that there will be no paid, meaningful work for your kids. Hell, by the time a girl who is born today reaches 20, she won't even be able to prostitute herself.... companies are making sex robots already! Landscapers? Who needs a landscaper when 3rd and 4th generation Roombas can trim trees and cut the lawn as easily as today's Roombas are vacuuming your carpet?

There are only 2 solid options.... a negative income tax that takes from the rich and gives to the poor.... or cease all procreation! Is your life so empty that you need to bring a child into this world, knowing that the odds are going to be stacked against him? I don't know why any educated person still thinks that they need to have a kid or kids.... just deep social programming I guess....

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/07/world-without-work/395294/

This is only the first page of one of many similar articles.....

Text Size

The Atlantic Daily, our free weekday email newsletter.

*1. Youngstown, U.S.A.*

The end of work is still just a futuristic concept for most of the United States, but it is something like a moment in history for Youngstown, Ohio, one its residents can cite with precision: September 19, 1977.

For much of the 20th century, Youngstown's steel mills delivered such great prosperity that the city was a model of the American dream, boasting a median income and a homeownership rate that were among the nation's highest. But as manufacturing shifted abroad after World War II, Youngstown steel suffered, and on that gray September afternoon in 1977, Youngstown Sheet and Tube announced the shuttering of its Campbell Works mill. Within five years, the city lost 50,000 jobs and $1.3 billion in manufacturing wages. The effect was so severe that a term was coined to describe the fallout: _regional depression_.



Youngstown was transformed not only by an economic disruption but also by a psychological and cultural breakdown. Depression, spousal abuse, and suicide all became much more prevalent; the caseload of the area's mental-health center tripled within a decade. The city built four prisons in the mid-1990s-a rare growth industry. One of the few downtown construction projects of that period was a museum dedicated to the defunct steel industry.

This winter, I traveled to Ohio to consider what would happen if technology permanently replaced a great deal of human work. I wasn't seeking a tour of our automated future. I went because Youngstown has become a national metaphor for the decline of labor, a place where the middle class of the 20th century has become a museum exhibit.

Derek Thompson talks with editor in chief James Bennet about the state of jobs in America. 

 
"Youngstown's story is America's story, because it shows that when jobs go away, the cultural cohesion of a place is destroyed," says John Russo, a professor of labor studies at Youngstown State University. "The cultural breakdown matters even more than the economic breakdown."

In the past few years, even as the United States has pulled itself partway out of the jobs hole created by the Great Recession, some economists and technologists have warned that the economy is near a tipping point. When they peer deeply into labor-market data, they see troubling signs, masked for now by a cyclical recovery. And when they look up from their spreadsheets, they see automation high and low-robots in the operating room and behind the fast-food counter. They imagine self-driving cars snaking through the streets and Amazon drones dotting the sky, replacing millions of drivers, warehouse stockers, and retail workers. They observe that the capabilities of machines-already formidable-continue to expand exponentially, while our own remain the same. And they wonder: _Is any job truly safe?

********************************************************************************************************************************_

_Please read the entire article before writing an attack post!
_


----------



## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

Or the government can seize the tech companies and claim the robot technologies for the greater good.

Then americans can be fat and lazy while their robots do all the work.


I mean... that's what I see happening.


----------



## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

Stevie The magic Unicorn said:


> Then americans can be fat and lazy while their robots do all the work. I mean... that's what I see happening.


And these guys thought it would take longer....


----------



## AcuraDrvr (Jul 11, 2018)




----------



## 404NofFound (Jun 13, 2018)

It won't be cheap in our lifetime. Humans will crash into them. Cars will get stuck in precarious positions. A prankster using shopping carts would be sufficient to end its day.


----------



## henrygates (Mar 29, 2018)

Self driving cars isn't going to happen any time soon. And when it does it will be a novelty for a long time. They still need drivers behind the wheel. So...how is that profitable for Uber? Instead of basically shoving all the costs onto the driver, now they have to purchase and maintain expensive self driving cars, which will have to be replaced likely every 5 years, plus hire a driver to sit and babysit the car while it drives itself around, plus deal with all the damage the pax will inevitably cause.

Instead of paying a driver minimum wage to use his own vehicle to drive people around, they are going to be paying a driver minimum wage to use their expensive high tech car they own and maintain? How does that even make sense?

Some estimates have at least a million or 2 million Uber drivers on the road in the US. Even if they just rotate drivers and run the cars 24/7, how is Uber going to buy a million cars that cost $50k+ each and put them on the road within the next DECADE?

Since when has a navigation system taken you from A to B with ZERO human input? Construction, data errors, all need human intervention to actually reach the destination. And what about accidents? Will the public accept them? In AZ the self driving car ran over a homeless meth addict and the media exploded. Just imagine if...when one of these cars plows down a group of 8 year olds walking to school in an upper middle class neighborhood. Game over.

It just doesn't make any freaking sense. What's more likely - Uber will be slammed with regulations and become a taxi service that pays minimum wage.


----------



## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

henrygates said:


> Self driving cars isn't going to happen any time soon. And when it does it will be a novelty for a long time. They still need drivers behind the wheel. So...how is that profitable for Uber? Instead of basically shoving all the costs onto the driver, now they have to purchase and maintain expensive self driving cars, which will have to be replaced likely every 5 years, plus hire a driver to sit and babysit the car while it drives itself around, plus deal with all the damage the pax will inevitably cause.
> 
> Instead of paying a driver minimum wage to use his own vehicle to drive people around, they are going to be paying a driver minimum wage to use their expensive high tech car they own and maintain? How does that even make sense?
> 
> ...


In the big picture, they will likely have to partner with someone who has a fleet of SDCs. They provide the pax, the app and navigation, while the fleet manager cleans the cars and charges batteries all day and night.

Last year they paid drivers around $8.9 billion, so there is plenty of room for negotiation with some major company that thinks they can make it big renting their fleet to Uber or Lyft.

People say that big money is smart, does not make mistakes. In the above scenario, someone will get taken for billions. I hope it ends up being Uber, personally.


----------



## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

henrygates said:


> Instead of paying a driver minimum wage to use his own vehicle to drive people around, they are going to be paying a driver minimum wage to use their expensive high tech car they own and maintain? How does that even make sense?


They won't be "drivers." They'll be "attendants," cheap positions easily filled by 3rd world immigrants who flock here for jobs. The attendants will monitor self-driving "people movers," vehicles that are designed for quick loading/unloading of pool-pax in high density areas. The "attendant" will no longer be in control of an app that allows for laming or gaming of the system. Uber's plan is to eliminate as much human intervention as possible when deciding pickups so they can gain max volume of paying pax pickups.


----------



## henrygates (Mar 29, 2018)

Uber's Guber said:


> They won't be "drivers." They'll be "attendants," cheap positions easily filled by 3rd world immigrants who flock here for jobs. The attendants will monitor self-driving "people movers," vehicles that are designed for quick loading/unloading of pool-pax in high density areas. The "attendant" will no longer be in control of an app that allows for laming or gaming of the system. Uber's plan is to eliminate as much human intervention as possible when deciding pickups so they can gain max volume of paying pax pickups.


Whatever they call them they can't pay them less than minimum wage. Most drivers already make minimum wage using their own vehicle and overhead. Now Uber pays minimum wage plus all vehicle expenses and fuel. Again, how?


----------



## AcuraDrvr (Jul 11, 2018)

SDC's...... still a good, long way off for all the reasons mentioned here.

IMHO, "enjoy" uber as long as you can. They are giving drivers the proverbial middle finger way too soon. 

Until they figure out that they need to slow down pumping money into SDC's so much, they need to focus on keeping drivers around. They will fold if they don't figure this out. And I'm guessing they'll figure it out eventually as they realize that strategic SDC dream of theirs is still further away than they'd like. 

I've heard one of Uber's biggest expenses is lobbyists. And another is paying out large driver sign-0n promotions. Maybe they should just focus less on new driver promos and focus on keeping the good ones around that they already have. If they stop paying lobbyists, what would happen? City by city, or state by state anti-uber legislation???


----------



## henrygates (Mar 29, 2018)

They just laid off their SDC attendants.

At the same time Uber cut driver pay they were sending me $2 off every ride all week coupons for a month.


----------



## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

henrygates said:


> Whatever they call them they can't pay them less than minimum wage. Most drivers already make minimum wage using their own vehicle and overhead. Now Uber pays minimum wage plus all vehicle expenses and fuel. Again, how?


Volume, volume, volume! Increased ridership due to decreased driver interaction with an app; no more denied requests, and all cancel fees go to Uber.
And if you're seriously only making minimum wage, you should already be doing something else anyway.


----------



## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

Uber's Guber said:


> Volume, volume, volume! Increased ridership due to decreased driver interaction with an app; no more denied requests, and all cancel fees go to Uber.
> And if you're seriously only making minimum wage, you should already be doing something else anyway.


Min wage is a slow night driving a cab.

Uber?

Min wage hasn't been possible for such a rediculously long time... it's not even time.


----------



## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

Here is an article of Lyft's 3 part plan

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...BucQqUMINzAG&usg=AOvVaw2RkaMTOhAe536FN1ZAMnn5


----------



## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

Mista T said:


> Here is an article of Lyft's 3 part plan


Incrementalism indeed. First on the list for SDCs is to target all them high-volume pool-users in high-density areas that drivers tend to ignore, that's where the low hanging fruit is.


----------



## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

One part in the article mentions that they can't be used in any place with a bike lane.

Guess my job is secure for a few more decades, lol.


----------



## luckytown (Feb 11, 2016)

Mista T said:


> One part in the article mentions that they can't be used in any place with a bike lane.
> 
> Guess my job is secure for a few more decades, lol.


Until New York and New Jersey still have pot holes on the roads we are all good for years...


----------



## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

I don't see Americans giving up personal car ownership. Risking being late for work because calling an SDV get's dicy at 6:00 AM?

This isn't something that's going to happen...


I don't think the majority of people are going to give up car ownership, i just don't buy that entire premise.


----------



## bsliv (Mar 1, 2016)

Stevie The magic Unicorn said:


> I don't see Americans giving up personal car ownership. Risking being late for work because calling an SDV get's dicy at 6:00 AM?
> 
> This isn't something that's going to happen...
> 
> I don't think the majority of people are going to give up car ownership, i just don't buy that entire premise.


How would a TNC get my boat to the lake? How would a TNC get me to my favorite ghost town 150 miles away down a treacherous 4wd road? How would a TNC take me and my large family and pets on a undetermined destination road trip?

On the other hand, some cities may want to seem progressive and mandate all cars have automatic emergency stopping and turning abilities.


----------

