Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Taxi and Spend Politics
Let's start with a simple fact: late this past Friday evening, I waited about an hour for a cab for a ride home from the South End. The reason for this is simple: I was dumb enough to tell the dispatcher I was going to Eastie.
Imagine that you're a taxi driver and you have a fare that will pay you about $15. Good, but you'll probably have to drive empty back to downtown, so that's worth $7.50. Now imagine that between tolls and the notorious Massport Fee (which cabs pay when transiting the tunnels even if they never enter Logan), you add on $6.50 in tolls, of which by law you are only allowed to charge the passenger $2.25, leaving you a happy $3.25 in fare for ~30 minutes of work. Oh, and that's before you pay for your medallion, gas, Basic brand smokes, etc.
See, by law, cabs pay Massport about $3 for the privilege of being on the same side of the Harbor as Logan. If the passenger goes to Logan, they can charge that to the passenger along with the tolls. But, if the passenger is going to Eastie, they're not allowed to charge them the Massport fee--but the taxi driver still has to pay it!
This setup is exemplary of government thinking at its finest:
1. We want to fleece the out-of-towners, so we'll charge taxis outrageous tolls
2. It's too hard to actually assess the fees on cars entering the airport, so we'll just hit them when they cross the tunnel
3. Since the locals would go bullshit if they had to pay those tolls, we'll say they don't have to
The problem of course is that taxis are free to go to great lengths to avoid taking fares to Eastie, and given the math, who can blame them. What happens in the end is that most of us end up asking the driver what the real cost is and tipping that on the top. ¶ 6:09 AM
Let's start with a simple fact: late this past Friday evening, I waited about an hour for a cab for a ride home from the South End. The reason for this is simple: I was dumb enough to tell the dispatcher I was going to Eastie.
Imagine that you're a taxi driver and you have a fare that will pay you about $15. Good, but you'll probably have to drive empty back to downtown, so that's worth $7.50. Now imagine that between tolls and the notorious Massport Fee (which cabs pay when transiting the tunnels even if they never enter Logan), you add on $6.50 in tolls, of which by law you are only allowed to charge the passenger $2.25, leaving you a happy $3.25 in fare for ~30 minutes of work. Oh, and that's before you pay for your medallion, gas, Basic brand smokes, etc.
See, by law, cabs pay Massport about $3 for the privilege of being on the same side of the Harbor as Logan. If the passenger goes to Logan, they can charge that to the passenger along with the tolls. But, if the passenger is going to Eastie, they're not allowed to charge them the Massport fee--but the taxi driver still has to pay it!
This setup is exemplary of government thinking at its finest:
1. We want to fleece the out-of-towners, so we'll charge taxis outrageous tolls
2. It's too hard to actually assess the fees on cars entering the airport, so we'll just hit them when they cross the tunnel
3. Since the locals would go bullshit if they had to pay those tolls, we'll say they don't have to
The problem of course is that taxis are free to go to great lengths to avoid taking fares to Eastie, and given the math, who can blame them. What happens in the end is that most of us end up asking the driver what the real cost is and tipping that on the top. ¶ 6:09 AM
