The road I drove

A Testimony from the Inside and the Outside

Diagnosis: The Road I Knew
I drove a taxi in Toronto for twenty-eight years. I entered the industry in 1988, before the smartphone, before the app, before the algorithm. I drove through the age of the radio dispatch, the cash fare, the regulated meter, the queue at the airport. I was not a participant in the system. I was a pillar of it.

Back then, the structure was clear. There was the plate owner — the one who held the licence, the one who leased it out for monthly income. The driver who paid that lease was not an owner. The driver was a quasi-owner — paying for the right to drive, but never holding the key to the door.

Then there was the brokerage — the middleman who charged the driver fees to connect them to fares. The brokerage did not drive. The brokerage did not own a plate. The brokerage owned the connection. And the connection had a price.

Then there was the garage — the one who aligned with the brokerage, who had taxis for city-licensed drivers to rent on a daily or weekly basis. The taxi worked twenty-four hours. Most garages had a day shift and a night shift. The driver paid for the shift. The driver paid for the gas. The driver paid for the insurance. The driver paid for everything — and at the end of the day, the driver was at the bottom of the chain.

The plate owner collected the lease. The brokerage collected the fees. The garage collected the rental. And the driver drove.

I drove twenty-eight years. I saw the streets change. I saw the passengers change. I saw the rules change. But the structure did not change. It was designed to be stable. It was designed to be protected. And it was designed to keep the driver at the bottom.

The plate was the key. The brokerage was the gate. The garage was the cage. And the driver was the one who paid for all of it.

Excavation: The Root of the Cage
The taxi industry was not an accident. It was a construction. It was built by the city, the regulators, the plate owners, the brokerages, and the garages. It was designed to protect a limited number of plates, a limited number of drivers, a limited number of earnings.

The driver who leased a plate was not an owner. The driver was a renter of a right — a right that the city had invented and the plate owner had purchased. The plate was the key that opened the door to the market. But the driver did not own the door. The driver owned the key. And the key could be revoked.

The system was not designed to serve the driver. It was designed to serve the plate owner. The driver who drove was not the owner. The driver who drove was the worker — the one who did the labour, paid the expenses, bore the risk, and received the smallest share.

The system was not designed to serve the passenger either. The passenger had no choice. The fare was fixed. The service was limited. The quality was inconsistent. The passenger was captive — not to the driver, but to the system.

The system was stable. The system was protected. The system was unfair.

Deconstruction: The Arrival of Uber
Then Uber came. And the cage was broken.

I watched it from the inside. The app. The surge. The rating system. The ease of the ride. The passenger loved it. The passenger had a choice. The passenger had a price. The passenger had a rating — a way to see the driver before they got in the car.

The old system did not have that. The old system was blind. The old system was a lottery. The passenger did not know who would arrive. The passenger did not know what the fare would be. The passenger did not know if the car would come.

Uber changed that. The passenger saw the car. The passenger saw the price. The passenger saw the rating. The passenger had control.

But what did the driver get?

The driver got an app. The driver got a rating. The driver got no plate. The driver got no protection. The driver got no minimum wage. The driver got no benefits. The driver got no share of the platform’s value.

The driver was not a partner. The driver was an algorithm.

The driver who had been in the system for twenty-eight years — I watched them leave. I watched them lose their plates, their investment, their identity. I watched them become drivers again — but this time with no plate, no protection, no history.

The passenger won. The platform won. The driver lost.

And the plate owner? The brokerage? The garage? They were not the victims. They were the ones who had been extracting from the driver for decades. When Uber arrived, the extraction moved — from the plate owner to the platform. The driver remained at the bottom.

Reconstruction: What the Road Should Be
The problem is not Uber. The problem is not the taxi. The problem is the structure.

The taxi industry was a cage. The platform industry is a cage. Both are designed to extract — one through regulation, the other through technology. Neither is designed to serve the driver.

The sovereign alternative is not the old monopoly. It is not the new platform. It is a driver-owned, driver-governed, driver-benefiting industry.

What would that look like?

The driver would own the vehicle. The driver would own the platform. The driver would own the data. The driver would own the route. The driver would own the fare.

The driver would not be a renter of a plate. The driver would not be a renter of a brokerage. The driver would not be a renter of a garage. The driver would be a partner in a cooperative.

The plate owner would not be a landlord. The plate would be a shared asset — owned by the collective, managed by the collective, benefiting the collective.

The brokerage would not be a gate. The brokerage would be a service — owned by the drivers, managed by the drivers, serving the drivers.

The garage would not be a landlord. The garage would be a facility — owned by the collective, managed by the collective, serving the drivers.

The passenger would have a choice. The passenger would have a price. The passenger would have a rating. But the passenger would not be the master. The passenger would be a guest.

The system would be local. The system would be democratic. The system would be accountable to the drivers, not to the shareholders.

That is not a dream. That is a reconstruction. And it is possible.

Activation: The First Turn
I left the industry in 2017. I have seen the transformation from the outside. I have seen the passengers get the convenience they deserved. I have seen the drivers lose the security they earned. I have seen the industry change — but not in the way that it should have.

The taxi industry was not killed by Uber. It was killed by its own failure to evolve. The plate system was a cage. The brokerage was a gate. The garage was a landlord. The passengers were captive. The drivers were exploited. The industry was so stable that it forgot how to change.

Uber did not create the wound. It exposed the wound.

The sovereign response is not to mourn the old system. It is not to celebrate the new system. It is to build the system that should have existed all along — a system that serves the driver, the passenger, and the community.

The road is long. The road is not straight. But the road is the road. And the driver knows it best.

*****

I. Ras Gad Shangox owned and operated a Taxi in Toronto for 28 years before 2016 when he sold his plate and became licensed as a delivery truck driver. His series “Pocket Wisdom for Sovereign Minds” was born of his curiousity about the relationship between individual words and their impact on human consciousness and behaviour. Shangox’ writing is founded upon his original ideas and then polished with AI.