Bring on the robots

Yes, This Is Better

So I've been hearing about robot cars for nearly my entire career as a rideshare driver. Seven years of it's happening, your hustle is going away, what do you think about it, etc. And I've covered this before and at length (shorter: tragedy of the commons, filthy cars without human drivers exerting social pressure, generational unease)... but tonight, dear reader? I'm ready to be replaced.

Here's why.

1) The social skills of passengers are in free fall. When I started doing this, very few passengers would play audio on their phone without headphones; now, it's the majority. If they took a phone call, they'd apologize and try to cut it short. Now, they are on the phone for the entire trip... and I think I know why.

The reason, of course, is that they've had some past bad interaction with a driver, or think the driver is going to scam them in some way, either by taking the wrong route, canceling the ride on a multi-stop drive, or give them a bad rating. Maybe they had a driver hit on them. In any event, the safer play is to let the driver know that conversation isn't just unlikely, but actively discouraged. As if I couldn't get the hint, honestly.

2) An ever-dwindling percentage of passengers want the driver to speak, or to speak to the driver. I'm an outlier; I confirm the address, tell the passenger about water and hand sanitizer, and I'm generally done in five to ten seconds... and that's five to seconds too many for a growing percentage of passengers. Yes, seriously.

3) The overall deterioration of discourse in the country. I'm a small white guy with a clean hybrid, and any number of people seem to think they know my politics -- left or right or otherwise -- on sight. It gets tiresome to fight Culture War for low wages. Once the cars are driven by robots, we'll all get to talk to each other less, and that's what we really want, right?

Well, no. 

But I can't push the ocean back with a broom, no matter how many good talks I sometimes pull out of people.

Just say no to shared rides

And clown payment

Now that the pandemic is fading, Lyft and Uber are going back to offering shared rides. These date back to the start of the rideshare industry, and create the situation where strangers ride with other strangers.

Here's why this is bad now, and has always been bad, for drivers.

1) If there are no other passengers on the route, it's just a cheap solo ride, which is to say, sub-survival money for drivers. Don't tell yourself any different. Your driver knows, on some level, that you are paying as little as humanly possible for the ride. It's not as if we're making a bigger percentage on this from any other ride.

2) While I'm sure it's happened at some point in the history of the industry, shared ride passengers don't tip. Not now, not ever. (Go ahead, prove me wrong. You won't.)

3) The vast majority of people who take shared rides are annoyed when... the ride is shared. Especially if they wind up with the short end of the algorithim's decision on who gets to where they are going first. Backseat driving is rampant among rideshare passengers. It's multiplied with shared rides.

4) Passengers are more likely, not less, to make additional demands on the driver (taking the water that's mostly there to inspire tips without tipping, yelling out the window, asking for access to the sound system or a phone charge, changing the temperature or music, changing directions, asking for stops, etc., etc.) on a shared drive.

5) Shared rides are also subject to surge pricing, so these pay as little as possible riders... may be really annoyed at the price.

6) Shared rides mean selling every seatbelt. I drive a small hybrid hatchback. It legally fits five adults. If five adults are in my car, no one will be happy about it.

7) As you might have guessed from the top 6 reasons, your driver isn't in a great head space when you enter the car. It's like you are starting the ride with two strikes on you, so if you aren't ready and waiting in a place where it's safe to stop from the start? We're furious with you. For reasons.

So, given all of that... why do drivers take these rides?

Simple, because we have to. We got unlucky while other drivers, all around us, didn't. Drivers have to take a certain percentage of rides that are offered to them to stay on the platform. We work to stay on the platform, not for the platforms.

If we're chasing a bonus on rides completed, shared rides can almost work out to a decent hour. But that's a pretty rare event and requires driving for one app only, which is also not usually the best way to make a buck.

So, if you're taking a shared ride? Be on time. Be good to the driver. Know that you're working on a 2-strike count. And know that we're looking for any excuse to 3-star you and not take your shared self ever again.

Were the savings worth it?

Princeton Hijinks

This place harbors weirdoes

When you drive rideshare in central New Jersey, most of your fares are going to be in Trenton or Princeton. These are very different worlds, separated by only about 15 minutes of highway driving. 

People worry about me when I drive in Trenton, due to the higher crime rates, bad roads and challenged people. But the reality is that Princeton also has whackadoodles, and while the roads are better, the rampant deer and greater chance of long rides to places I don't want to go to (cough, Newark Airport) don't make it a dramatically better choice of where to work.

Anyhoo. Two recent stories.

 Two teenaged white bros, going to a Princeton municipal golf course. I am invisible to these princes, and their phone conversation is loud... which is why I know their plan for the day. Stealing a golf cart, driving onto the course to meet up with their friends who are mid-round, and drink, I think. They don't have clubs to help them in this charade, or any past experience that this kind of thing will work. I 3-star them to make sure that I'm not a getaway driver later...

Pick up on the Princeton campus. Upper class student, talkative, engageed in high scholarship. We have a fantastic conversation for 20 minutes as I take her into downtown Trenton. It's a nice Sunday afternoon, and I'm dropping them off at City Hall... which is closed today. I ask them why, and after a sheepish few seconds, she admits that her destination is the weed shop across the street. I pivot to note that there is a closer weed shop to Princeton now, but that this seems to be a very good one as well, and it's good of her to patronize stores in neighborhoods that probably need the business more...

"Do you want me to use it?"

YOU! FORCED ME TO USE IT!

 A young passenger gets into the car and I tell them about the water and the hand sanitizer. 

They have a unique reaction and question. "Do you want me to use it?"

I shrugged it off and didn't make it awkward, dear reader. The rest of the ride passed without incident. But in retrospect? Kind of wish I had.

Possible reactions...

> Say yes in a very slow and creepy voice. Then ask if it's OK if I watch.

> Say yes, because they are then contractually obligated to tip.

> Confess that they've thwarted my scheme, and I've gotten away with it for so many years.

> Say yes, because things go badly when people try to eat it.

> Say yes, because I make my own. The critical ingredient is my dog's tears. Do you like it? DO YOU REALLY LIKE IT?

> Say I don't care, because I've lost the will to live and can't care one way or the other. Let's drive.

> Say yes, because if they don't, Daddy George Soros will be ever so angry.

> Get way too intense and say no, I *need* them to use it.

> Just start speaking in a made-up foreign language, a la Andy Kaufman in "Taxi", because their question clearly broke my brain.

> Spend the rest of the trip chanting numbers, since language has clearly failed us as a species, and it's time to just rely on something that can't produce replies like that one any more...

Five bucks of difference

The pick up is at the Trenton airport. This is a 2-gate airport that I don't love working, because it often takes me out of state or to remote and unprofitable suburbs, the local cops really enjoy harassing rideshare drivers, and the place where passengers are supposed to go for the pickup has no cover, so they don't want to be there -- but the cops won't let you get them at the gate. It's bliss. But into every rideshare driver's life, some airport must fall, so have at it.

The passengers are  a white family of four, with two kids who are likely under 10, and parents that are likely in their 30s. They've flown Frontier from Florida and stagger off to the pick up point, filling up my hatchback trunk and then the car. We're off for a 15-minute drive to Pennington, a burb with speed traps and really irritating local cops, but into every rideshare driver's life, some Pennington must fall. Let's see if I can chat with the family.

Turns out yes. Dad golfs, so that takes up a couple of minutes. I then pivot him off that by asking them if they are coming back from Orlando (no, but they've been), then tell them about Knoebels because they like amusement parks. Fifteen minutes go by swimmingly, with both kids feeling comfortable enough to chat, and they are adorable. I drive away returning a little boy's wave, and make my way back to preferred areas. 

And wait... and wait... for the telltale sound of whether I got a tip. Because this ride wasn't great without one. Because the place I dropped them off at clearly indicates they are doing fine and can spare one. Because they are healthy, happy, have just come back from a vacation... and reader? I haven't had one in something like eight years. My own children are no longer adorable young cherubs, the debts and obligations that I have pretty much force me into this car way too often, and the glow is gone. I'm simmering. Here's the soundtrack for that.

Five minutes pass. Goddamned Pennington. Goddamned airport pickups. Goddamned burb people. FML. No surge prices, I hurt, I'm going to be doing this goddamned job for way too long. What's the point? Even when the hustle goes well, it's exploitation. I'm stupid for doing this. I deserve it. All on cycle.

Ping.

Five dollar tip on a nine dollar fare.

The soundtrack changes. It always does.

And will soon change back.