The author is mixing political arguments related to public transit funding, unionization and classification of workers with an analysis of Uber's financials and

The author is mixing political arguments related to public transit funding, unionization and classification of workers with an analysis of Uber's financials and strategy, and I think it weakens the argument. Travis understood that Uber doesn't deserve its multiple without self-driving cars, he thought it was such an existential problem that he conspired to launder trade secrets from Google in order to jumpstart his program. His reasoning, I think, was that Uber's business model precludes it from being the exclusive platform for drivers (because of their IC status), meaning that he could never raise prices past the point where it entices a new competitor, nor can he lower payouts to the point where drivers abandon Uber. Uber has to do the heavy lifting to convince local jurisdictions to allow ridesharing and then any newcomer can swoop in and compete if Uber gets too greedy. Uber's greatest asset is that it's first and has a massive userbase, but for a cheaper ride many would compare prices in a new app without much thought. This doesn't mean that it's not very helpful to consumers to have on demand ride apps! I'm glad they exist. I live in suburbia and the other day I had to travel to a train station that was about 20 miles away. Public transit would have meant an hour and 2 bus transfers, Uber got me there in 25 minutes for the same cost. Lots of criticism of Uber compares it to dense urban areas with a taxi fleet, but there weren't taxis here before Uber, there were only car services at much higher prices. From a consumer standpoint, we should be happy that these platforms exist at relatively low cost, we end up getting rides via a very convenient app for only a 25% markup on what the driver grosses per ride (less including tip) -- and that middleman fee is likely to continue to get squeezed. The author presumably gets that they are popular because their very popularity seems to be an issue -- it's argued that the public is less likely to want to invest in public transit when Uber is available. One can't also argue that the general public is ditching Uber. It's sort of a Yogi Berra argument -- "That place is so crowded no one goes there anymore."