How Progressive Cities Fight Innovation by Jared Meyer

Author:Jared Meyer [Meyer, Jared]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Sociology, Urban, Business & Economics, Government & Business, Technology & Engineering, Social Aspects, Regional Studies
ISBN: 9781594039522
Google: DPGaDgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Encounter Books
Published: 2017-06-13T04:11:04+00:00

“Instead of placing blame on Airbnb for housing shortages, politicians should embrace the service and evaluate their regressive restrictions on new housing development.”

Policy makers who insist on fingerprint background checks must be watching too much CSI. These checks are far from the foolproof tool that they are portrayed as on TV. As the Cato Institute’s Matthew Feeney argues, “Fingerprinting is not as effective as Hollywood might have you believe. The FBI fingerprint database is incomplete, in part because it relies on police departments and other local sources adding relevant data and keeping that data updated.”

In other words, fingerprint background checks are only as effective as the databases of fingerprints that they pull from. In Maryland, certain traffic violations—including DUIs and reckless-driving incidents—would not show up through fingerprint background checks. Name-based background checks avoid this failure by querying thousands of courthouse and law enforcement databases to find relevant records.

Fingerprint databases also include arrests that did not lead to any convictions. If someone is arrested and fingerprinted but then found not guilty or never charged with a crime, that information would need to be updated by law enforcement for fingerprint background checks to be effective. Yet this follow-up step is often overlooked, which leads to discriminatory results.

Law enforcement personnel do not have the time to keep these records updated because fingerprint databases were designed to aid in solving crime—not vetting for-hire vehicle drivers. Since about one in three felony arrests end up with no conviction, fingerprinting leads to many qualified drivers without criminal convictions being denied work opportunities. The Urban League, NAACP, and National Black Caucus of State Legislators all oppose fingerprinting requirements for this reason.

Fixing these errors is difficult. University of Maryland professor Michael Pinard testified at a public hearing about the requirements that it would be “difficult if not impossible” for people without law degrees to challenge the faulty results from a fingerprint background check.

The most troubling result of Austin’s ride-sharing regulations is not that two successful start-up companies will lose revenue by pausing their operations in the city—it is the new problems and dangers posed to Austin residents.

No background checks are perfect, but ride sharing’s safety record shows that the companies’ current policies are working well. The safety standards that Uber and Lyft voluntarily hold themselves to are even stricter than those required of Austin taxis. In addition to providing safer transportation than taxis do, ride sharing’s business model makes it very easy to police drivers. The locations of both parties are tracked through the duration of the trips, identities are verified, and no cash changes hands because of the platform’s electronic payment systems. In other words, if drivers commit crimes while working for Uber or Lyft, they must be doing so because they want to get caught.

When evaluating the potential risks of new technologies, it is important to weigh them against the real dangers posed by the status quo. For example, New York City’s police commissioner, Bill Bratton, told women to use the “buddy system” when riding in the city’s taxis.

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