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Comment by beachy | Hacker News Reader

Really? As a bottom dweller, rather than a master of the universe, I don't see any great harm.

Take Uber. A great service, cheaper rides, what's not to like. If investors stop subsidizing then and Uber was wiped from the board, who cares? I'll find some other way to get a ride. In fact their impact has only been positive, in shaking up the moribund taxi industry. I certainly don't see how it increases consumer costs in the long term, and quality has clearly benefited. Some of those benefits will stick even if Uber tanks.

As to "entices investors to eschew fundamentals and gamble on hype", frankly who the hell cares? Investors are big boys and girls, they don't need hand holding.

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It's called dumping. You have artificially low costs temporarily in order to put competitors out of business. Once that's achieved, you then increase prices.

I'm actually not sure how dumping would work when done by Uber, though. Individual taxi drivers will go out of business, but there's little barriers to entry to new taxi drivers starting out again once Uber starts to flex its pricing power. Of course the picture changes if Uber starts to lobby for regulatory protection. You have to look at the micro details of the market to see whether there's a problem there.

Unless it's changed over recent years my understanding is that in many cities there was a high barrier to entry for taxis in the form of licensure. In some cases only a finite amount, causing sky rocketing prices. From what I've read it's similar to how some areas in the US have limited alcohol licenses (usually a per capita system in that case iirc), often they are then auctioned off for higher and higher prices where permissible.

Bigger cities typically regulate taxis and sell licenses to operate to taxi companies, who then employ or contract the drivers.

Uber was always an unlicensed taxi scheme. Their planned business model was to ignore the law to reduce costs, then sell rides below cost until everyone else is out of business.

That law is classic regulatory capture and anti-consumer, though. I have no problem that bad laws which are hostile to people are being broken.

> That law is classic regulatory capture and anti-consumer, though.

Taxis are usually regulated by law to provide mandatory service to an entire area at the same tariff - no discrimination based on the time of the day, the source or destination (e.g. "surge pricing" for events or effectively no service in poor neighborhoods), or if the passengers have any sort of disability.

When the regulated option goes out, a lot of people suddenly live at the whims of capitalist overlords and AI algorithms, but not under the rule of law any more.

When Uber has wiped out half of the taxi industry and has made public transit infrastructure and development non existent, what you are left with is a damaged society.

When WeWork buys hundreds of properties and prevents companies from establishing their offices in the city center, making you even more dependant on cars and leaving a dead city center, what you are left with is a damaged society.

When DoorDash forces thousands to live a precarious life, surviving only by delivering orders 16 hours a day to barely make minimum wage when taking into account gas and depreciation of your car, forcing small restaurants to lower their prices or close (because they cannot ever match the economies of scale of McDonald's), what you are left with is a damaged society.

It is a form of social dumping, of selling at a loss, and only benefits you for a very brief moment, before leaving with with a damaged society. Then, the options are, the company succeeds and inevitably raises their prices threefold to make up all of that lost money, fucking you over, or the company fails, and all your infrastructure is gone.

They don't need hand holding. I don't give a shit about their well being. They need hand cuffing, to protect our society from their destructive practices.

With Uber, there's creation of positive economic surplus by (1) optimizing how well drivers are able to connect with riders based on distance, and (2) allowing drivers to create individual brand value through ratings which incentivizes better service. In a decentralized network of taxis, you get waste because riders can't connect with the closest taxi easily, and worse service because there's no brand equity to protect.

So on this point, I actually put the causal blame onto the homeowner lobby for causing our cities to facilitate cars over public transport. Uber is just downstream from planning decisions made a long time ago.

I have little sympathy for the other marketplace companies like DoorDash, though, because I don't view the end service (delivering unhealthy food) as particularly valuable to anyone except themselves, so all we're left with is rent seeking.

If you don't believe Uber's goal is rent seeking, I have a bridge to sell you.

Your points about how Uber creates brand value and optimization is nice and all, but maybe have a look at the consequences of it not on the economy, but on people: same problem as Doordash, paid like crap, having to work 16 hours a day while paying for gas and your vehicle. I will not praise such a predatory model because I can rate a dude 5 stars for giving me a bottle of water. You know why ? Because if I don't rate him 5 stars, at some point Uber will just decide "fuck off, your average score is below 4.5, you don't deserve to work" and kick them out. In every country they've come, Uber has abused every kind of gray area (or straight up black area and just decided to pay the fines) to destroy any existing or potential competition. Forcing employees to register themselves as individual contractors when they work all the time for Uber, while not getting any of the benefits that Uber should be paying for ? Yeah, that's their standard.

It's not a "homeowner lobby" pushing for cars. It's a first and foremost car lobby (reminder that jaywalking is a crime invented by the car lobbies), as well as a lack of foresight (and corruption) from the competent authorities. I don't know about the case in the US, but no homeowner lobby in Europe will say "oh no, don't build a tramway line" or "oh no, a bus stop". Public transit nearby makes a home's value skyrocket.

Rent seeking is their goal, but that's irrelevant to whether they also create positive surplus value through the mechanisms I outlined.

The economy vs. people distinction is a false dichotomy. Consumers (who are also people) can benefit from more efficient service provision and higher quality service.

> It's not a "homeowner lobby" pushing for cars.

It's the homeowner lobby pushing for sprawl, which indirectly leads to cars because public transport can't be properly provisioned across spawl without huge cost. Once you have sprawl enforced by law, everything else follows as a guaranteed consequence: networks of roads to connect that sprawl, and therefore cars.

>Consumers (who are also people) can benefit from more efficient service provision and higher quality service.

Consumers can also benefit from child slavery to buy their clothes ever cheaper, but we've decided as a society that it was kind of uncool to do it. But if you're willing to sacrifice a bunch of workers to drive for your comfort 16 hours a day, being paid like shit, feel free to. But pretending it creates positive surplus value while ignoring every single negative externality is laughable.

I am not "pretending" that it creates positive surplus value. It does create surplus value through simple mechanisms.

Also, it's unfair to say I am ignoring every single negative externality. All I did was challenge the questionable claim that Uber has much to do with the state of our cities being car-centric and underprovisioned by public transport, because the root cause of that situation is homeowners, not Uber. I didn't give my blessing to all of Uber's practices.

> sacrifice a bunch of workers to drive for your comfort 16 hours a day, being paid like shit

Putting aside the false analogy to child labor, I don't accept the framing that all low wage labor is uncool. It's a type of mindless compassion that can actually lead to anti-utilitarian outcomes in practice. Although I have no positive or negative judgment of Uber in particular regarding this point, because I haven't looked into it for Uber. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32627174

Many cities and their suburbs were car-centric before Uber and many will be car-centric after Uber. Perhaps somewhat fewer will feel the need to own a car (or a second car) but that doesn't really change the basic nature of transportation options. If anything, there's probably been a (little) bit more attention paid to public transit and things like bike lanes in some cities during the period Uber has existed. Many of us use Uber or Lyft once in a blue moon. My life wouldn't change one iota if Uber vanished tomorrow.

Well first of all Uber drivers don't have to work 16 hours of day, that's a straight up lie(in Europe). Can you work 16 hours a day? Sure, you can. But you have to be very clear about the sort of person that works 16 hours a day driving Uber: It's a person that literally cannot get hired to 99.9% of other jobs. Uber didn't cause this, but previously these people would be either on unemployment or doing crime.

You don't seem to understand. There are no "Uber drivers". Except in very select countries (I believe that Uber recently lost a case in Italy ? Can't remember), there are self employed people, whose (only and very demanding) client is Uber. This means that worker protection is out of the window. There are no legal limits to it, if you want to work for three consecutive days, go for it.

And having talked to many Uber/Freenow/etc drivers (because, yes, i also am brought to using it sometimes) in Paris and throughout France, many, many, many of them start their day at 6,7AM and go on until 10PM or later. These guys are not criminals, they were previously contracted taxi drivers, electricians, all kinds of jobs who just fell on a bad thing in life and had to make money another way, now leaving them mostly stuck with this job. The ones making those hours were open about what they make, on average about 2000, 2200€ per month. Which, for 16 hours a day is fucking miserable,and for a city like Paris isn't a whole lot.

But actually, don't take it from me. The median take home in France for an Uber driver is 1617€ per month, with a median work time of 45 hours. Hint: it's barely above minimum wage. And, since Uber doesn't guarantee work and they're paid by the ride, many of them work on the side to guarantee they don't get fucked out of two day's salary when unlucky. https://www.journaldunet.fr/management/guide-du-management/1...

When people say Uber drivers, they don't mean "oh he is employed by Uber as a driver", they just mean "he drives Uber".

Your 2nd paragraph above confirms my comment. Uber isn't the one who forced those shit working conditions on them, except for those who were employed as taxi drivers previously. They fell on a bad time, and Uber allows them to make money in bad conditions. Would you like them to just wait it out at pole emploi instead?

You misunderstand the trap that is poverty. Uber isn't "allowing them to make money in bad conditions". Uber has become the condition. There is no getting out of being a Uber driver when your day is spent driving around. No ability to look for other employment related to what you were doing, no ability to get training for another job. Uber thrives on misery.

So, yes, pôle emploi is a better option for many. Note that driving an Uber doesn't even get you qualified for unemployment later on, should you want to stop.

Uber isn't the condition because it's still better than having no job, which is the alternative that you seem to falsely believe is preferable for these people.

App driving: simultaneously a poorly-paid exploitive arrangement and something in such demand that app companies can arbitrarily harm drivers by kicking them out.

Perhaps it’s worth looking into why so many people are seeking to be drivers on the platforms?

Sure, let's go, I'll start:

Poverty, unemployment, lack of opportunities, industries destroyed, invisibilisation of the working class, not wanting to die out in the streets because your country has potentially no or bad social nets, destruction of said social nets forcing people to take even miserable jobs. We can go on.

Here's a hint for you, since it's your turn: the amount of people doing Uber because they love driving people around a traffic-jammed city in a 300000km piece of shit car is close to zero

I talk to a lot of Uber drivers who seem to enjoy driving for Uber. I can imagine times in my younger life when I'd have enjoyed it as well.

How is any of that Uber’s responsibility or in their capacity to solve? Every single one of those issues is societal, which can only be solved by the people and their government.

"Lads, is it immoral to abuse the misery and despair of people to make money?"

Increasing the demand for labor increases prices for labor sellers. I do not see how it could be construed as worse than not creating that increase in demand.

If workers are choosing DoorDash, it seems like your ire should be directed at all employers other than DoorDash who are offering a worse or no deal to them.

> In a decentralized network of taxis, you get waste because riders can't connect with the closest taxi easily

I don't get this point. What was decentralized about taxis before Uber? Each city had a few competing taxi services, each with a dispatcher who would connect rides to drivers in a centralized manner. I assume they used some information about location when they did this. But even if they didn't, there's nothing decentralized about it. The only centralization Uber did was creating a huge conglomerate that spans numerous cities. But there's little efficiency to be gained by this. Uber is not going to dispatch a driver from a neighboring city to come pick you up.

I should have used the word fragmented. Fragmentation reduces the efficiency gains from physical network effects. If the overall network isn't fragmented, you get smaller average distances between driver and rider.

Another efficiency gain is from replacing a human dispatcher with a ML model.

Isn't this just an argument for a monopoly? Several competing taxi services would be fragmented. One monopoly taxi service would be more efficient. But in that case, I'd argue the municipality should just operate it as part of the public transit system.

It's a monopoly in the narrow vertical, but that power is diluted given the existence of close substitutes (driving yourself, bus, train, and some remaining old-school taxis). No doubt there is still some monopoly power, though.

> I'd argue the municipality should just operate it as part of the public transit system.

I'd probably prefer it if you just regulate their monopoly power. I don't like the idea of each municipality or country having to write their own software for an Uber-like platform. Seems like a lot of duplicated effort. And after the Obamacare website cost blowout, I don't trust government to write software well, it'd end up as money being stolen by people like Accenture.

Do you have any sources you can cite on point one? I can see that there could be a reasonable hypothesis that centralised services will reduce costs for drivers heading to pick up customers, or carbon emissions, both due to shorter journeys.

What I'd be interested in is whether or not that has been studied, how variable the gains are by locale (eg big city, small city, town, etc) and what the consequences are for driver pay and conditions. Likewise, effects on things like price paid per journey, both average and 95th percentile so as to gather peak pricing (which, in the UK at least, cabs don't charge).

It'd also be interesting to understand why this isn't done on a municipal level - eg, a unit of local government could buy one of the many, many off the shelf systems for this and require taxis to use it. Perhaps a few tweaks to make it multi tenant, so as to preserve the existing structures of taxi companies. I suspect this would confer the benefits of more efficient allocation, without the ill effects associated with Uberisation.

Doordash can deliver healthy food, too. It may contribute to bad eating and laziness for some, but it can also help people with limited mobility (or time) get better food than they otherwise could.

> and has made public transit infrastructure and development non existent

Can we stop blaming companies for bad public infrastructure investment?

Like seriously, lots of countries manage to invest in public infrastructure even while uber exists. Did Switzerland stop building trains? Did Paris stop improving the Metro?

Cities like Amsterdam keep improving their bike infrastructure despite uber existing.

Yes! The funniest part of this is that Uber just started showing public transit routes and selling tickets in Berlin, competing with official BVG app (no, thanks, I will continue using BVG).

How does DoorDash force drivers to work for them? It seems like they’re offering a compensation policy and drivers are determining that it’s among their best option.

Drivers have no better option. It's easy to blame them as if they had the myriad employment options software engineers do. They don't, and the opportunity/operational cost of gig-work is not obvious or easy to overlook when you need to put food on the table tonight.

If DoorDash represents the drivers’ best option, it seems to me that we should be at least somewhat supportive of the arrangement they voluntarily enter into.

Taking away the drivers’ best option is, as you observe, not likely to leave them better off.

True, they can choose between working a miserable job that at least allows them to live for a bit longer (which is a low fucking bar), or just die out in the streets. Capitalism is magnanimous.

There is nothing voluntary about not wanting to die. It's working under threat.

Isn't this just how survival works? You hunt / till the land / turn the wheel in the factory / deliver food ordered on the internet / X to eat. It's a lot easier now than before, for sure.

If in 2022, in some of the wealthiest, most advanced countries on the planet, you need to _survive_, there's something pretty fucked up in your society. I'm not saying all out FALGSC no-one needs to work and thrives, but you should be able to live decently without selling your body to corporations treating you as nothing more than expandable meat.

It turns out that it takes raw materials, labor, and energy for you to survive. Someone, possibly you, has to provide those things.

Have you tried Uber lately?

It used to be way cheaper than taxi's, and you'd reliably get one much faster than calling a cab or trying to hail one.

Now they've approached monopoly and need to actually start becoming profitable, it's become as expensive if not more expensive than taxi's. Plus for anything other than very long rides at surge prices you will get repeatedly cancelled, over and over.

I have just gone back to calling or hailing cabs.

It's almost as if taxi rates are prized the way they are for a reason. If you actually want to turn a profit that is.

Taxi rates are almost exclusively set by local regulation

Yes, but by and large that local regulation isn't divorced from actual costs--except perhaps to some degree in the case of fleecing visitors going from the airport to downtown.

That's not really true. Uber/Lyft have almost always been marginally profitable. Meaning they charge more for a ride than they pay the driver to perform it. Their massive losses mostly come from ridiculous overhead plus marketing to grow the business.

On the other hand, the taxi market never really worked because there's no price fluctuation to mediate supply and demand.

On one side you have places like Dallas, Atlanta, Phoenix, and others where taxis basically didn't exist for locals. On the other you had places like NYC where demand often outstripped supply. You wouldn't be able to find a cab or they wouldn't take you where you wanted to go.

You can also see it in medallion prices. They were so profitable in places like NYC people were paying a million plus simply for the opportunity to operate a cab. An obviously broken market.

Part of Uber's (not sure about Lyft) marketing budget goes into subsidizing rides.

For new customers/drivers yes. Not really for existing ones.

That "marketing" budget is not going to billboards, radio spots and banner ads, it's going to voucher codes and driver "performance bonuses". It's just subsidies by another name.

Again, just not true at all. Here is Lyft's financial statement:

https://investor.lyft.com/news-and-events/news/news-details/...

They have 875.5 million revenue against 440.3 million COGS and 126.3 million in Sales and Marketing. Even if every dollar of sales and marketing was a direct subsidy they're still taking in 308.9 million as gross profit. Or, in other words, they're taking 35% or so of fares.

Right, in a free market rides are incredibly cheap and have a 50% chance of getting more expensive at the end when the driver who hasn't had a background check robs you.

Honestly, it was pretty obvious that something along these lines was going to eventually happen. Taxis were generally not a high margin business. Why should Uber have ended up with lower pricing especially with all their overhead?

And the urbanites who baked subsidized Uber into their lifestyles will just have to adjust.

Because they were supposed to "optimise" the routes and enable true ride & cost sharing? It did look like that for a while with their lowest tier.

In Chicago Uber and Lyft are regularly twice as expensive as a taxi, with less money going to the drivers.

Imagine having a competitor receiving billions to take over the market, no oversight. They can afford to operate at a loss long after all competitors are bankrupt.

Competing against them would be foolish.

To get an idea of long term damage, imagine Uber and Lyft went bankrupt as they're running at a loss, what would you then use for transportation?, or imagine they 5-10 the price, not like you have alternatives. Sure, the taxis were crappy as alternative, but that was mostly due to limited number coming from regulation, they had no need to compete either.

> Competing against them would be foolish.

In default country maybe. Companies like InDriver, Didi, Yandex, Gett, Taxi Maxim clearly show that you can launch a competitor and grow for many years, eventually outcompeting American startups which then abandon the markets they don’t consider of high importance (see Uber-Yandex deal).

Somehow SoftBank managed to invest in companies that work on highly competitive markets and do not have any innovative breakthroughs to defend their position. Creating an app is certainly not a breakthrough nowadays, you need to optimize the core of the business, which remains labor- or resource intensive. Uber tried to invest in self-driving vehicles, but that happened too early. In the end the winners in transportation will be the fleet management branches of automotive giants like VW, when they will start rolling out their solutions on the streets. Similar thing will happen to delivery. Companies like WeWork will grow organically (even if they begin like startups — last investor will loose the money).

> To get an idea of long term damage, imagine Uber and Lyft went bankrupt as they're running at a loss, what would you then use for transportation?

Some other competitor that would gladly replace them. The still existing local car services? Public transportation?

I worked for a European competitor before Uber and there were tons of taxi and car services that were already in operation. It was just not centralized in one app. And for most people that mostly stay in 1 city its totally fine.

Uber really is mostly useful if you travel a whole lot.

Sure the price might be higher because is no longer subsidized by Soft Bank but that's not bad, that's simply paying a fair price.

But many countries have anti-trust regulations that take effect once competition is reduced to a certain level.

If a company like Uber can be divided into multiple Ubers that have to compete with each other, then the over-investment by venture capitalists can still be turned into a societal win.

> Competing against them would be foolish

Lyft does fine, as does Didi. Revel, an upstart in New York, is expanding.

True in the short term, imagine if a company becomes so dominant that little competition exists and little interest exists to create competition ( search engine ? ) that they can set the price they want. Then you are stuck paying whatever they demand obviously within reason . at 100 for a 5 min ride will entice some competition

> imagine if a company becomes so dominant that little competition exists and little interest exists to create competition

This is the core of Softbank / Vision Fund investing thesis. The current events seem to show that this is not so easy to achieve even with tens (hundreds ?) of billions to burn in the process.

If they run out of steam, a lot of companies will have been over-bloated and then run to the ground in the process, but this will not have caused any new monopoly.

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