I visit Toronto 4-5 times a year for business. I love the city and think it's one of the most interesting and vibrant places in North America. However, the Toronto cab industry does need some work. I've started taking the UP train service to and from the airport. It's a little pricy, I guess, but it's still half the price of a cab and twice as fast. The worst thing about the cab service though is not the price. For me, the issues have been: dangerous driving by cabbies in order to get to the destination as fast as humanly possible; shady things such as the driver's face not matching the face on the ID card dangling from the mirror (just who the fuck is this guy driving the cab if not an authorized driver???); unbelievably dirty cabs; unsafe cabs, with every service and warning light on the dashboard permanently lit up; and incomprehensible drivers.
Toronto is not alone in having these types of problems with cab services. The experiences are the same for me in Calgary, Vancouver and Edmonton. In general, things seem better in American cities such as Chicago, New York and San Francisco.
I can sort of understand the cabbie's dilemma. It can be a tough job with some asshole customers, and you aren't going to get rich doing it. But that doesn't explain the deterioriating conditions in the industry in terms of service, safety, quality of vehicle, price and courtesy.
I recently read a news story about the financial difficulties of the UP service. I guess some Torontonians are not happy that public dollars went into this service. I will say as an outsider, though, that the UP service is fantastic. I hope they are able to survive financially. There is no way on Earth I would ever take a cab to or from Pearson as long as UP is there.