Wouldn't it be nice if every time you got into a cab you knew exactly what it would cost? You wouldn't have to watch the meter wondering how high it would go or wonder if the driver might be taking a more circuitous route to your destination to pad the fare. And yet I don't know of any taxi service anywhere that offers this.

In many major cities you will find flat rate taxi fares from the airport out to certain "zones"---for example, you can get a flat rate cab from midway Airport to any downtown Chicago destination. But what if a taxi service offered a flat rate between any two points? You hop in, tell 'em your destination, and they immediately tell you the cost. Some people would say this is cumbersome for the driver, but my Flat Rate Taxi company would have a GPS system installed in every car, so the driver would know immediately how far away the destination is and could attach a price to it. As a consumer you could immediately decide if you wanted to pay it or find some other mode of transport.

I was in Miami once and our driver got completely lost and then tried to charge us $75 for the ride. We had to argue for 15 minutes to agree on a compromise amount. With Flat Rate Taxi, such incidences would be a thing of the past.

Is this a good idea? Are there taxi services that already offer this? (I couldn't find any on a pefunctory search engine search.)