This is obviously not true in general. If it were, business would grind to a halt. Businesses cannot be responsible for every action that any employee might tak

This is obviously not true in general. If it were, business would grind to a halt. Businesses cannot be responsible for every action that any employee might take while on the job. What does this suggest? That arguments in absolute terms on either side are wrong. Which further suggests that there is some balance to be struck between responsibility and efficiency - between negative externalities and economic productivity. The litmus test that I posit makes sense here is one of two things: - High-impact correlated risk - Inability of the market to compensate for the issue (due to informational asymmetries or agency problems, say) An example of the first might be nuclear weapons or pharmaceuticals. An example of the second might be restaurants food safety (attribution of sickness to a particular place, and estimation of sanitariness are difficult). I don't think uber meets either of these standards. Certainly there is no high-impact correlated risk. Which leaves inability of the market to provide this safety net. Pretty clearly, an Uber competitor could emerge that advertises the thoroughness of its background checks, and charges a premium for this service. If people want it, they'll use it. If they don't, it'll die. There is no need for the government to step in here.