The Robotaxi Revolution Is Here—But What About The Humans?

💡 How Rideshare Drivers Ended Up On The Front Lines Of An Automation War

The idea of a driverless taxi cab taking you to the airport is no longer science fiction.

It’s the daily reality in about a dozen U.S. cities and many more around the globe. After a decade of false starts, the autonomous vehicle revolution is upon us, whether we’re ready or not.

Just this week, Google-owned Waymo announced an expansion into three more cities (something it now seems to do every week). Tesla shareholders were so sold on a Robotaxi future that they handed CEO Elon Musk a trillion-dollar pay package. And new AV companies jump into the fray all the time, like Zoox, Avride, Wayve and others.

But what about the human who would’ve been behind the wheel of your airport Uber ride? We know that AI and increased automation are taking jobs, but not enough is being said about how rideshare drivers are among the first to face that shift.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. So I called up Harry Campbell: ex-Boeing engineer turned founder of the widely read newsletters The Rideshare Guy and The Driverless Digest. Harry’s steeped in both worlds—a close follower of the AI and autonomy space, and someone who talks to Uber and Lyft drivers all of the time.

“We’re at an interesting inflection point right now,” Campbell, himself a former rideshare driver, told me. “The hype, the investment, the quantitative and qualitative excitement around AVs right now is at an all-time high.” That includes the AV boom of the 2010s that went bust at the close of that decade. Things have changed now.

“But I do think the driving job for humans is going to exist for a while,” Campbell said.

🙅 How Rideshare Drivers Feel About The Rise Of AVs: