In Reply to: economists please advise this logic posted by albert on Friday, 7. October 2005 at 08:59 Bali Time:
Beenthere touched on all the major things, but I'm still not sure it all adds up.
The quote from the Organda bloke that fares have to increase 45% just to cover the fuel price increase does seem at odds with fuel being 17% of operational costs.
Other things make more sense... the recommended 36% increase in fares earlier in the year was ignored by many companies to keep the fares competitive, so this is like two increases at once.
Spare parts are going up 30%... I'm not really sure why there is such a jump in that cost.
Minimum wages will rise... but other than Bluebird (I think), who have 9000 out of 26,000 cabs in Jakarta, taxi drivers work on commission, or hire the car outright from the operator and keep whatever profit they make. So that shouldn't have too much impact.
General inflation is expected to be around 13%.
Toll road prices have increased about 25%. You can pass three or four of these from Jakarta airport to the city. But that's usually a set addition to the fare.
Bus fares have risen around 25%, from what I can gather, though there have been reports that some minibus drivers are demanding fares from customers above the set limits. Like 3000 instead of 2000.
So, really, after adding it all up, it seems that they've given their opening offer with the expectation of having it haggled down quite a bit.
Personally, I'd like to see taxis and many private cars in Indonesia (especially Jakarta) by golf buggies and dodgem cars. Most of the time that's the speed you're travelling (if you're lucky). Or at least have cars converted to gas (of which Indonesia is a huge exporter).