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Regulations sometimes pretty minimal. Theres little to stop anyone from making a better Uber. Careful, there. Various jurisdictions are getting smart and comin

Regulations sometimes pretty minimal. Theres little to stop anyone from making a better Uber. Careful, there. Various jurisdictions are getting smart and coming at Uber and Lyft in ways that aren't easily dismissed by the "we're just disrupting, bro" or "rent-seeking rent-seekers gonna rent-seek" arguments that typically are brought out. Specifically, they're acting in ways which follow logically from taking claims at face value. Uber claims its drivers aren't employees, so SF is saying they need to pay the same registration fees as every other sole proprietor operating in the city, and on the other side of the country in NY there's a suit pointing out that a bunch of "independent" contractors who all somehow perfectly coordinate changes to the fares they charge are a perfectly obvious violation of antitrust law.

randyrand 11y ago
Then SF is a good example of regulations gone bad. SF regulations should encourage competition, not diminish it.
- ubernostrum 11y ago
  If every other sole proprietorship in the city has to pay a registration fee, why shouldn't an Uber driver have to? The "rules for thee and not for me" attitude is a big part of why people dislike Uber as a company.
  - randyrand 11y ago
    No one should be paying registration fees. Registration is incredibly cheap in the day of computers, and their costs are not justified. They're also regressive, and hurt the small guys most. Laws should encourage free market competition, not diminish it. So in that vain, a registration fee needs to be removed or otherwise paid for through tax revenue. There are already enough reasons starting a business is hard, we don't need to add more.
    - ubernostrum 11y ago
      No one should be paying registration fees. Except the Uber approach isn't to try to truly level the playing field. It's to just decide "this law is inconvenient, I'm going to let my competitors deal with the overhead of it and ignore it myself". There's no high and lofty principle in that, just arrogant entitlement.

randyrand 11y ago

Then SF is a good example of regulations gone bad. SF regulations should encourage competition, not diminish it.

ubernostrum 11y ago
If every other sole proprietorship in the city has to pay a registration fee, why shouldn't an Uber driver have to? The "rules for thee and not for me" attitude is a big part of why people dislike Uber as a company.
- randyrand 11y ago
  No one should be paying registration fees. Registration is incredibly cheap in the day of computers, and their costs are not justified. They're also regressive, and hurt the small guys most. Laws should encourage free market competition, not diminish it. So in that vain, a registration fee needs to be removed or otherwise paid for through tax revenue. There are already enough reasons starting a business is hard, we don't need to add more.
  - ubernostrum 11y ago
    No one should be paying registration fees. Except the Uber approach isn't to try to truly level the playing field. It's to just decide "this law is inconvenient, I'm going to let my competitors deal with the overhead of it and ignore it myself". There's no high and lofty principle in that, just arrogant entitlement.