Now, I’m not posting that to defend this Zeman fella at all. I don’t think that high schools or colleges should have organized sports programs, and especially not coaches who are the highest paid person in the district.

However, Jack, I have to push back on the myth that teachers just “get” 3 months off in the summer. I have a family of teachers, and during the school year, they work well over 40 hrs a week, and don’t get overtime. If you want to see someone put in a string of 70 hour weeks, just talk to most any teacher before the semester begins, before midterms, at the end of the semester, etc. etc. Also, they don’t get paid more over the summer. Usually they can take pay just during the year, or have it prorated out throughout the summer. So, if they’re getting “paid” in the summer, it’s because they’re getting paid less throughout the whole year, ie, having the district do their budget for them. I could name a dozen teachers in my life who have had summer jobs to make ends meet till the next school year starts. I think that stuff all evens out.

There’s a huge problem with the amount of administrators to teachers and how much they’re being paid, and pension systems are going to come to a crossroads for all public institutions. But I think you’re cherry picking situations, taking them out of context, and then ranting on them. I know teachers who are making far less, with far more work, in districts where even YOU would be too afraid to walk down the street without wearing body armor, but I know enough to know that that isn’t standard across the board, either.

It won’t be a swift or universal conversion over to a subscription service, but it will happen.

Obviously, you are correct, cities will be first. Many people in one location, not far to travel on average commutes, many of the people don’t own cars as paying for parking costs more than the car, gas and insurance combined. They rely on cabs and public transport now, so this is a welcome option for many. In rural communities, even if service is reliable, no company’s going to stage a fleet of vehicles within a 30 minute drive of your location. The guy in the city calls the car, it’s there in a minute or less. You would have to plan your trips further in advance. They would also stage fewer vehicles in rural areas, so if they’re all taken, it might be a while. Right now, the further away from the city you are, the more you’ll still need your own car.

There will be opportunities for us country folk however. If you’re planning a trip, you don’t need to take your truck. Calling a car for a long drive may be worth it in gas savings compared to larger utility vehicles. Most of us in rural areas have a truck and a more fuel effecient car for different purposes. This would allow you to keep a big vehicle and only use the car as-needed without carrying payments and insurance on a light-use car.

Another advantage would be to parents. This can kill the “soccer-mom in a minivan” trend. You can simply schedule a ride for the kids when they need to get picked up or dropped off. Most reservations against services like Uber for this sort of use come down to the driver… can you trust them. When there’s no driver, there’s less of a problem. Parental concerns about child safety will likely be at the forefront. Perhaps a parent can see the vehicle on a map in real-time, or even change it’s course remotely, mid-route if needed.

Passenger identification will be an issue, but easily solved I suspect. You don’t want to call for a car and have someone else hop in and be carted away on your dime. An RFID card or some basic biometrics could solve that, and help parents know that their kids are getting in the correct car.

I foresee reserved automated vehicle lanes on Interstates, as automated cars can travel at much higher speeds, and much closer together without as many safety issues. I’ve seen plans with car-train hybrids where they could even physically link multiple cars together, and utilize the combined momentum to achieve better fuel economy. The car drives you to a dedicated track (not suitable for standard cars) and is linked up with others.

Many people work from home today over the internet. While the number of drivers is up, the number of daily commuters is down from what it was 10 years ago. A subscription service is likely very appealing to those people.

Deliveries will be more common as well. Not many grocery stores deliver right now. They easily could, but paying a two dozen drivers makes it cost prohibitive without minimum purchase requirements which deter a lot of customers. This could do-away with pizza deliveries and even some parcel services. I imagine a garage door “docking system” of sorts. When you place an order for something, the automated vehicle is deployed. The transaction uses a one-time, expiring code to open this delivery door in your house. It then backs up to it and dispenses a standardized box. These could be insulated packages for hot and cold products. It’s more secure for medication deliveries, and would cut parcel theft dramatically. It would be easy to sense if the delivery bay was full, and alert you to clear it before the vehicle is even loaded and deployed. As these vehicles could double as transport and use existing roads, I think it’s better than amazon’s flying drone proposal. The vehicle could leave dispatch, pick up your package from a carrier, securely, then take on passangers between leaving the carrier and making the delivery. You could call a car to pick you up from work, but the car leaves two hours early, picks up your dry-cleaning first, then swings by KFC for a bucket of chicken, then grabs your kids from their after school activities and they arrive to pick you up just as your work shift ends. Those errands would be done for you, without requiring you to be present, saving you hours every week.

There are other advantages as well. If there is an accident on the road, automated cars don’t slow down to look. In fact, they can be diverted to other roads in real-time, making the accident site safer for first responders and saving you from traffic jams. Likewise, in an emergency, they could be deployed to create road-blocks. If there’s a road that washes out in heavy storms, the automated cars could create a barricade to prevent manual drivers from entering into a hazardous area, unaware of the danger. If some idiot rips off a gas station and gets involved in a high-speed chase, police could call in empty vehicles to shut down roads, even run a Pit Maneuver (assuming the guy’s not in an automated car himself which I’m sure will have law-enforcement overrides).

No more speeding or parking tickets 🙂 You are just a passenger after all. Insurance rates should be a lot lower, as the driving patterns are easily quantifiable. Insurance is all about risk assessment. Once the risk becomes static, the need for insurance is minimal. That means vehicle mechanics will become much more uniform. Predictability is the whole point of this, so cars will have similar top speeds, acceleration rates, and a uniformity is design makes servicing them much cheaper and easier. While there may be cosmetic differences, the underlying mechanisms will be largely the same.

There is also no reason this needs to be limited to cars. Automated earth moving equipment already exists for mining. Advances in the tech with cars may mean you can get a driverless backhoe to dig your pool or a foundation based on a preprogrammed survey plan. It might even be included in your subscription. The same goes for boats. Monday you’re driving on your normal commute, the service sends the cheapest, most reliable option, whatever they have available, you don’t really car. Tuesday, you’re meeting a client at the airport and taking them out, so you call in a luxury town-car to take them out on the town. Wednesday you have a long drive to attend a conference, so you get an SUV for a bit of extra comfort and leg room. Thursday you’re helping your friend move, so you switch your preference to “Van” for a little extra carrying capacity. Friday, you’re blowing off work for a long weekend fishing. A truck pulls up equipped with a camper. You arrive at the campsite and get an automated boat which takes you to the best fishing spots on the river.

Then you have integrations with other smart devices. How many people now have heart-rate monitors on their watches? It’s easy for such a device to tell if you have a heart attack or stroke. What if it happens while you’re riding in a car? Your smart watch could tell the car “Go to the hospital now”, even if you can’t. Meanwhile other cars are making way for you on the road, just as they would an ambulance. Any car you enter can get your music playlist from the cloud, so you always have your music playing in any car you ride in. No more cumbersome tapes and CDs, fiddling with radio presets, or trying to get the damned blutooth to sync. The car pulls up and your playlist is already playing. You tell the car “Let’s go get some sushi”, the car could display a menu while you’re on you way there, or put your name in at the desk if you don’t have a reservation. In fact, I see that become so pervasive it becomes invasive with advertising. But it might work to your advantage. The car is a neutral party. When you say “Drive me to the Black Angus Steak house”, the car may respond “You have an incoming offer for 10% off and immediate seating from Outback Steakhouse. This will add 4 minutes to your commute time. Would you like to change your destination?” It’s fertile ground for new marketing strategies.

There is also the privacy concern… Your comings and goings will be recorded by the company who owns the fleet. They will be subject to sale for marketing purposes, and subject to subpoena. The privacy concerns stand on their own as self-evident. What worries me is the impact it will have on shit-writing for TV crime dramas. “We pulled your autocar records and established you went to the sorority house, then to home depot to buy plastic sheeting and a shovel, then out to the exact spot in the woods where we found the girl’s body”… “No I swear it was a disgruntled technician at the car service who’s framing me”…

And then there’s horrible company names… “Auto-Auto”, or some random, made up word like “Bleeb”, as in “Wait right there, I’ll hop a Bleeb right over! Be there in 10 minutes.” It’s the narcissistic humor of would-be tech billionaires, they love using goofy words to make everyone who uses their products sound like idiots. You can’t “search” for something you have to “google” it. Can’t call a taxi, you need to “call an uber”. Not one of these companies will have the decency to call a car a “car”, it must be something ridiculous sounding, condescending etc. Or they’ll go with the obvious. I’ll bet the voice-assistant in the Mercedes is actually named “Mercedes”.

So some things will get better, some will be just be trading current problems for newer problems. But I don’t see anything, aside from the privacy concerns which would really be show-stopper.