HAPPY “SURGE PRICING” NEW YEAR! (1867)
A blinding snowstorm welcomed in the New Year in the City of Brooklyn in 1867. From “daylight and until early noon” the snow was “falling, falling fast,” as “thousands of juveniles commenced the year industriously, by earning their New Year’s gifts, in sweeping and shoveling the snow off the sidewalks. ” In spite of the snowfall, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported that “there never were so many open houses and never so many callers.” SURGE PRICING IN 1867 “Callers, as a general thing, didn’t mind the snow much, while to the keepers of livery stables, the appearance of the morning air, filled with its myriad snow flakes, became a vision, exceeding in its richness the fabled mines of Golconda.” In a word, these taxi drivers were seeing dollar signs within the Brooklyn snowfall. And the harder the snow fell, the more money their sleighs would be bringing in. “They knew that the light wagons for which they had been paid in advance, would not be taken out, and for sleighs they could charge such prices as they chose.” Like a modern-day taxi service – upon which rested no fixed rates – these 19th century taxi hacks would begin to set new prices on their services, determining – based upon the wiles of the consumer and the availability of the taxi driver – how much their service was worth on the new snowclad market. “Only think of it, fifty dollars for two or three hours use of a vehicle of that […]
