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I think Uber has a big bet on self-driving cars where $7 per ride can be sustainable. The hope is that they can use investor's money till then to subsidize ride

• mlthoughts2018 8y ago
  But even then, unless Uber develops and owns severe patents on the self-driving technology, the self-driving car inventory would just be a commodity available to every competitor too — meaning it would be a race to the bottom on prices and potentially fewer barriers to entry, unless they use lobbying to create a livery licensing racket for self-driving cars to protect some oligopoly of ride hailing services. My bet is some form of oligopolistic regulatory capture is the long-term plan (similar in spirit to ISP oligopoly), because if self-driving cars are a commodity it still doesn’t look like that offers a path to profitability.