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Comment by BobbyJo | Hacker News Reader

You're overlooking that net new value was created in both of the scenarios. Don't you have any idea how many family horse businesses went under with the invention of the car? How many artisans wound up broke post-industrialization? We can both agree that we'd all be much much poorer in the world where those things didn't happen. NVidia makes a huge margin on the things they sell. Is that theft?

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No they aren't overlooking it. They literally call out the additional net value created (i.e. iPhone hw sales), and then call out that to make the enormous amounts that they do make, they also crib value from others (i.e. app store).

You can argue that the app store and vetting process itself is worth up to or over 30% (i.e. they are giving value away, not extracting it), but they make a clear distinction.

Overlooking was the wrong word. I meant more like downplaying or underestimating. Uber completely changed transportation, and the legal saga that follows shows just how big of a change they made on the world, for better or worse. Likewise with Apple and the iphone. They created (or popularized depending on how you want to frame it) the platform that now dominates the human condition. We are literally fumbling, on a global scale, with how to interact with our phones because of how much influence they have over us.

The issue isnt that theyre overlooking new value created it's that you're overlooking the enormous power imbalance some parties are using to exploit others for material gain.

Uber's profit margins are about 10% value created and 90% exploitation of power imbalance between the rich corporation and itinerant drivers and less well capitalized competitors.

Whether somebody acknowledges this reality or not tells you where their political allegiances lie.

> Uber's profit margins are about 10% value created and 90% exploitation of power imbalance between the rich corporation and itinerant drivers

That feels like a number you are just making up based on hating Uber.

The entire "app-based rideshare market" was created by Uber, and in 2026 they don't capture anywhere close to 100% of it. An Uber driver's share of profits without Uber existing is $0.

Back before Uber existed I was ordering a taxi on a website and they even had real time tracking. Yeah it wasn't an app, but most things weren't at that time.

Why is that relevant to what I said?

Because what you said is nonsense. They are capturing a fraction of the value they created with the invention of app-based ridesharing. They are not dipping into some magical pool of "exploitation" to juice that. Anyone that is unhappy with being an Uber driver can literally do anything else. Nobody is forcing them, there is no exploitation.

Absolute horseshit.

They maintain an app and some servers and do some cursory checks on drivers. Those things are pretty easy to do.

In a properly competitive market for ridesharing apps those things would be commoditized to the point that they are pennies per ride.

The vast, vast majority of the value is getting you from A to B whether you are in denial about that or not.

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