The New York Times has a story about the New York Taxi and Limousine Commission requiring taxi drivers in New York to dress "professionally."

That Cabby Dress Code? It’s Getting a Makeover By Michael M. Grynbaum November 25, 2010

There is a dress code for New York City cabdrivers. Seriously. It is right there on Page 23 of the 62-page manual the city issues to cabbies detailing the rules and regulations regarding their conduct and comportment.

No tube shirts; no tank tops; no bathing trunks. Sartorial scofflaws face a $25 fine. Truth is, though, the rule has come to be regarded as at once overly specific and underenforced.

Now, the city’s taxi regulators want to change that. The Taxi and Limousine Commission is issuing a new dress code – broader in language, in the hopes it can be more widely followed: all cabdrivers, the new code states, must ”present a professional appearance.”

The models for what the New York cab driver is wearing now are:

• The cabdriver Nazmul Haque.
• The driver Fuad Hossain.
• The driver Hafiz Mohamedein.

Other interviewees include "Dido Goze, a driver from Ivory Coast" and [Ms.] Bhairavi Desai, the executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance.

They also interview one guy I know for sure is a white American—Graham Hodges, the author of Taxi! A Social History of the New York City Cabdriver,. Hodges[Email him]is a professor at Colgate now, but he was a New York City cab driver when he was working his way through CUNY—40 years ago.

That's how long it's been since there were Amerricans driving taxis.