GPS + IRS = SOL

Privacy issues are quaint but this makes a little more sense:

In two largely ineffective strikes this fall, taxi drivers said the GPS devices and credit card payment systems amounted to an invasion of their privacy, as well as an added nuisance and cost. Many drivers are now complaining that the city’s ability to track their miles, fares, and hours worked would create an explicit money trail in what has long operated as a cash-based profession.

With paper trip sheets, drivers are not required to itemize every fare on their tax returns. The GPS records of fares, however, could be obtained from the Taxi & Limousine Commission and used in an audit, a spokesman for the city’s Department of Finance said.

“Nobody wants to pay taxes,” a taxi driver, Coicou Emmanuel, said. “Some drivers never tell all of what they’re making — a lot of people lie. The GPS will tell everything you’re making.”

Mr. Emmanuel, a Haitian immigrant who has been driving a taxi for 22 years, said many drivers are worried that after installing the tracking devices and credit card machines, they could have to report earnings of up to $5,000 more this year than last year.

. . .

Because they are considered freelance workers, taxi drivers also cover their own health insurance, and many depend on Medicaid or state-sponsored health insurance.

The average taxi driver makes between $25,000 and $30,000 a year driving five days a week, a spokesman for the Taxi Workers Alliance estimated. Reporting higher salaries could push some drivers to levels where they would no longer be able to qualify for state health insurance plans. To qualify for Medicaid in New York, a four-person family can have a monthly net income of $1,109, and resources of up to $6,650 a month.