Hello. First off, I want to say thank you for what you do, professor. I'm wondering why TLC/FHV drivers can't simply put their own app out that (ideally) wouldn't take ANY commission. It's my understanding that there is no exclusivity with drivers and platforms (Uber, Lyft, Juno, car service base and etc); meaning an Uber driver is a Lyft driver and a Juno driver all at once. Juno is an interesting story because it got sold for $200,000,000 to Gett and only lived in the market for one year. They just gave out $50 phones to drivers that were already driving with Uber and Lyft and only charged them 10% commission (compared to Uber and Lyft's 20%.) This movement of "for the drivers" was its own selling point to the both drivers and passengers. You hardly seen any ads for Juno but they sold for a lot of money in a short period of time because of their share of the marketplace that they carved through that mantra. So my question: why can't the workforce recognize that they physically own the market and create their own app that can offer the driver the whole 100%? In a competition sense, $1,000,000 to build a GPS app that processes credit cards (ie Uber Lyft etc) doesn't seem like much to bring the antedote to the scam that these "ride-sharing" hustle bring along. Sounds like it can be even crowd-sourced. No other company would be able to compete. True P2P.
I believe that there are worker coops already functioning in the space and that they have figured out what you have, namely that by removing the profiteer, they can offer the same driving service to customers at a lower price while still earning a living for themselves as drivers "associated in a worker coop." If they can solve scaling problems to compete with economies of scale of Uber etc - or if scaling is minimally necessary - this is a recipe for success that will inspire others.
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