What Taxi Shortage?

Cab drivers must be some of the most embittered people in this city. So embittered that if you offer them a raise, as the Mayor has proposed doing, they're likely to throw it back in your face.

"It's no good for the driver," says Alamgir Kabir, waiting inside a Brooklyn depot for his shift to begin. "It's good for the cab company." That's because the drivers expect the money they pay to rent a cab will also go up. And a few suspect the Taxi and Limousine Commission will also take a cut, through higher fees or fines. (The commission denies it will.)

"Whenever they are going to raise the rates, I'm still going to end up making the same amount of money," says Gilberg Jefferson, after 15-plus years of experience. "I made more money back when I started and it was a 75-cent meter. Whenever it was 11 o'clock, you made your money for the day."

Ostensibly, the TLC is considering a hike of between 12 and 15 percent to lure new drivers into "the Industry," as insiders call it, as if it were as glamorous as Hollywood. And ostensibly the shortage of drivers, down either 5 or 25 percent from capacity depending on whom you believe, stems from poor business since Sept. 11. So raise rates to get more workers so that they can meet demand, right? But there wasn't much demand to be met anyway, was there? Wasn't that the problem? The downturn in business?

None of these arguments for or against the rate hike makes particular sense. But that shouldn't come as a surprise. The Industry doesn't make a lot of sense either. It's free enterprise ruled by a bureaucracy, and a patois of several dozen dialects governed by the Protestant work ethic.

First, the driver shortage didn't start on Sept. 11. It started four years ago. Franklin Lambert, spokesman for Malcolm Management, a taxi company with 156 vehicles in Park Slope, says he has lost 160 drivers due to the stricter rules that began that year. (The rules came after a record number of accidents involving cars-for-hire.) Some of those drivers failed drug tests, he says, but others dropped out because of paperwork screwups or their passengers got out at red lights and a cop happened to see it. "Every day, 30, 40, 50 cars are left behind," he says. Cabbies leave for easier jobs, and those who stay avoid places like Pennsylvania Station. "It's like Ticketmaster down there," says Andy Marat, a driver with a Manhattan garage. "The police are waiting. You come through. They find a reason to give you a ticket. It's automatic."

The TLC denies that the 1998 rules are causing the shortage. "The truth is that about four years into the program, we've revoked the licenses of less than 1000 drivers," says Allan Fromberg, deputy commissioner for public affairs at the commission. "We've made it more of a professional industry, a safer industry, a more viable industry by getting bad drivers off the road."

Second, drivers are coming back of their own accord. Thank the recession for that. "The historical wisdom is that when the economy is strong, prospective drivers have other opportunities," Fromberg says. "If the economy is depressed, we have an increase in interest." The commission issued 26 percent more licenses from last July through January than it had for the same period the year before. Drivers temporarily discouraged by really poor business in the fall are returning.

"I know four or five people who turned in their cabs after Sept. 11 and went back to Pakistan because business was so bad," says driver Sajid Syed, hanging out at the Dunkin' Donuts at 36th St. and 10th Ave. last week. "Now I know a couple, not the same ones, but a couple of new people who came over recently and are driving."

Third, the driver shortage is only a shortage if you own a cab and need to make money from it. New Yorkers complain about how hard it is to find a cab, but what don't New Yorkers complain about? (A study conducted in November by consultant Bruce Schaller found that a passenger in midtown will on average wait for three and a half minutes for a cab between 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. This sounds bad, but is it better or worse than before? Who knows? No comparable data exists for previous years.) Many fleets have not been able to charge drivers the maximum rate allowed by law. Liberty Taxi in Queens is offering the weekend day shift for $65?a 37 percent discount. (Most shifts are capped at $103, $112 on weekends.) "Drivers are making more money and paying us less," says Jeffrey Simon, the manager at Fabio's Brokerage Corp. in midtown. "They know they are a valuable commodity. They'll say, 'Heck, no. I'm not paying that. I'll go down the street and lease from the next guy.'"

If cab companies cannot get their cabs onto the street, the value of a medallion?the sort of franchise that lets the bearer lease or operate a cab within the city limits?will drop. Already, one can be had for $220,000, down from $250,000 in 2000.

That said, it's hard to believe drivers won't take home at least half of any meter increase, even if they're paying more in rent. And it's hard to argue that cab rates, which haven't budged since 1996, should somehow defy the rules of inflation. It's just that "the Industry" is one of the few bold enough to raise prices in the middle of a recession.