Thread by @ParadiseTrader3

1) $TSLAQ In the very early 90s, 2 taxi cab company founders approached me to run their new company after they merged. Both companies had some very bad dudes who drank on the job, sold drugs out of their cabs, assaulted passengers, etc. This graphic prompts my story:

2) I was paid 6 figures to come in, fire the bad guys, and take care of business ensuring all new hires toed the line of proper dress, random drug tests, and I would take seriously customer complaints about overcharging, hitting on female passengers, and so on and so forth.

3) Three times I ended up in the parking lot in fist fights to put an exclamation point on guys who threatened me or my family with physical violence. Bip, bap, boom, I put down all 3 of the bullies in cold no-nonsense fashion I learned in the US Army during the Vietnam era.

4) It took me all of 2 months to rid the new company of the worst indemnity risks, or so I thought. As a newbie, I dove deeper and deeper into how a cab company operates with insurers and taxis. Drivers were not the only big mitigating factor in Insurance costs.

5) I was quite surprised to learn the majority of our costs for a $79 lease of a cab for 12 hours from our company went to three things: 1. Insurance for accidents, 2. Maintenance & Cleaning, 3. Inventory of parts, tires, batteries, oil, accessories.

6) We had to fire the lout drivers to improve the new image of our new company. That worked in spades. But as I looked more deeply at our insurance issues I realized the insurers (we had several, they demanded we spread the risk) were also judging injury risk on (cont'd)

7) what used to be poorly maintained cabs which most times had at least 200 miles put on them in a 12-hour shift. Looking at our costs of maintaining cars which we bought off-lease, I soon went to the two owners to show them our lease rates had to go up to cover basics (cont'd)

8) such as tires, washer fluid, oil, batteries, maintenance, and with a certified "daily" 12 point check for simple things like air pressure/windshield wipers working/all lights working/all turn signals working, etc., we could then show a lower risk profile to insurers (cont'd)

9) to bring down our premiums. We did this so well it more than covered my 6 figure salary. This conscious daily "spotcheck" (military term to make sure your gear was squared away so you didn't get killed in the fields) requires strong management. (cont'd)

10) Using my platoon sergeant skills in the cab biz, I can assure you this:

1. There's no way Tesla's Robotaxi cost per mile is only .16 cents. In the early 90s my costs were more than twice that and I ran a very tight, lean shop.

2. Tesla hasn't factored in wear and tear.

3. There's no fucking way any car will be run 1 million miles in normal stop & go traffic in cities and suburbs. Highways? Possibly, but we don't have the data which backs up Musk's million-mile claim. But stoplight to stoplight? No fucking way.

4. Cabs have to be cleaned after every shift. I made drivers clean up after 3 pukes to make them understand why they were going to face a mandatory tip for my immigrants cleaning cabs after every shift. That one move right there restored empathy for our most overlooked employees.

5. Cleaning a cab takes 15 minutes to 30 minutes after every shift. Smudges on windows, trash in the floors, lost and found items documented, and washing the whole car after every shift.

6. Washing a cab twice a day without waxing the paint jobs ensured we would be repainting our cabs every two years - if they lasted that long. (Think about Tesla paint.) Most cabs lived 4 years tops. Without question, the biggest problems with inner-city cabs are suspensions.

7. Knowing what we know about the brittle nature of Tesla suspensions, I submit Teslas running just 12 hours a day, not 23, will not make it through one-year without a whompy wheel failure or major alignment costs with three or four sets of tires added in per year.

8. Teslas need longer downtime to recharge. How does an EV recharge itself if you're at an 8 to 5 job and your car is out there hooking Johns as passengers non-stop (in a Maximum Money in Minimum Time scenario) and we know battery life in year three won't match a new Tesla?

9) But where the big cost nut will come from is this: INSURANCE. A first-generation self-driving car with no "safety patrol" to monitor passenger behavior means there will be assaults, rapes, and more going on and no one to stop the car before an accident.

10) None of the above has been addressed by Elon Musk and Tesla. It's as though the problems of reality were swept under the rug yesterday and Tesla Robotaxis will be the most cost-efficient machines on the earth and make owners fabulously wealthy while appreciating in value.

11) Tesla is not set up to maintain a huge fleet of cars with poor paint jobs, brittle suspensions, tires which can't be carried as spares in a trunk, cleaned in a timely fashion, and checked daily for working lights, brakes, etc., while covering INSURANCE for injuries & deaths.

12. As a guy who knows the old-time cab business inside out, that's why I would short Lyft and Uber: I know these SOBs are not doing the deepest background checks on their drivers, I know their real costs will never be met at current rates, and furthermore I know this:

13. Tesla is the worst run company in America. If anyone for one minute thinks Tesla Robotaxis will save this company, you're not tethered to the real world of stupid people doing stupid things and thermodynamic laws of entropy. And as Elvis Costello sang accidents will happen.

14. Hence, that made-up chart at the beginning of this longwinded rant is something which came out of Elon Musk after eating a pallet of Colon Blow Cereal™. No one covers insurance, maintenance & parts @ .18 cents per mi. No one in 2019 on Planet Earth.

15. This "gig economy" where you turn people into less than minimum wage earners by selling them Billionaire's Vapor Rhinos farted out their Silicon Valley brains is just more take from the poor and send it to the rich. It is not a way to wealth. It's the biggest fraud.

16. So, let me reiterate: Robotaxis making Tesla and you $$$ at a cost of only .18 cents per mile while you sleep?

In the words of Mz. Sweet Brown, "Ain't nobody got time for that."

The name of someone's book about this con should be "The Biggest Fraud."