The Autonomous Cars News, Development, and Discussion Thread

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

Here’s the real nightmare scenario for self-driving cars

https://www.vox.com/energy-and-envir...ising-business

Advertising has a limit as a source of revenue. We already know this as Internet advertising is killing traditional media. We cannot have an economy based on advertising alone. I cannot see advertising alone being able to pay for our entire transportation network.

Also, the basis of the argument is faulty. While competition tends to lower prices, limited competition has the effect of increasing prices as we move towards monopoly and pseudo price collusion. There are many examples of this. While it may be possible to implement other software to compete, which is the basis of Uber and Lyft, it is much more difficult and costly to manage fleets of millions of AVs. Uber and Lyft are software companies, while the cost and risk of ownership is with individual car owners. It is an enormous leap to move these companies to own the vehicles as well. The cost of these companies assuming those risks will be borne by the customer.

The pressure will be on to assume control of transportation and remove individual car owners for safety reasons. At that point, convenience pricing especially during peak hours will increase rapidly to generate sufficient profit. A perfect example of this is Highway 407 in Toronto that was privatized and tolls were increased dramatically to maximize profit. The highway ceased to perform its original purpose to reduce congestion on the parallel and public Highway 401.