Elon Musk promises self-driving taxi cars across US as Tesla seeks to hire operators in NYC

Last month, Musk told investors, “I think we’ll probably have autonomous ride-hailing in probably half of the population of the US by the end of the year," per the Wall Street Journal. Musk has also said that with the software updates from the robotaxi data collection, self-driving operations on Tesla vehicles will also improve.

"Your Tesla self-driving capability will see a step change improvement as we integrate upgrades for the Austin robotaxi build into the general production release," Musk said last month.

A recent job posting from Tesla in New York City said that they are looking for drivers around the country to go around America's largest cities in the cars for data collection. The company is looking for "highly motivated self-starter[s] to join our vehicle data collection team" as a "Prototype Vehicle Operator."

The position requires that you drive the vehicle "for extended periods" and will be "conducting dynamic audio and camera data collection for testing and training purposes." The data collection will assist in training the software for the self-driving vehicle. The job pays up to $30.60 an hour.

Tesla's service will be bumping up against competitor Waymo in the robotaxi space, as the firm led by Elon Musk starts to carve out market share for autonomous driving taxis. Tesla is making similar moves to hire employees in California, Texas, as well as Florida.