Don't Look Back

I was sitting in front of Struck Catering on Hamilton Street today at half past noon when I took this picture. It was during a rather thin couple of hours with very little work.

When things slow down, I start looking at how much I've made for the day and figure what it would be for an hourly average. A slow hour can put a serious dent in that figure, and the longer I go without a fare, the worse it gets.

There's a make/break point in any money-making activity. The make/break point for me each day is whether I've made the equivalent of minimum wage by the time lunch rolls around. If it starts looking like I'll slip below the equivalent of minimum wage by spending any more time in that cab... well, it can be unnerving to sit there in one spot waiting for the next fare and it gets to be an hour with nothing. I can spend an hour making nothing at home, and enjoy it a lot more.

Then there's this...

If anybody in the taxi business in Worcester thinks this is going to be a great summer, then they've got another think coming. Meanwhile, the price of diesel fuel is already over four bucks a gallon. That means everything we buy costs more to transport to wherever the final point of sale is. Higher prices for everything (except taxi fares, painfully enough) means that fewer people will opt to take taxis, and this just says one thing to me... This business is fast approaching a point where that make/break may very well be something everybody's slipping below.

Personally, I think this summer is where everything is going to begin to bottom out with this economic downturn. I really don't think it's going to be a soft landing, either.