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Comment by stonogo | Hacker News Reader

Describing Uber as "ride sharing" is fantastically disingenuous. Have you ever lived in a place that did not have taxi regulations? Life gets fairly hellish that way. Drivers will pick you up and then pick other people up on the way to your destination... often until the van is full. There's no recourse for getting overcharged, assaulted, kicked out in the wrong place because a more profitable fare turned up, being totally SOL because the guy got a flat tire and does not have a support structure in place... this list goes on, and if you think it won't happen in America, good luck in your future endeavors.

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The question might sounds sarcastic,but it's not meant to be: so why haven't any of those instances happen to Uber's user? Does it mean that the regulation already applies to Uber (to a certain extend). Or is there any other reason?

who says they haven't?

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Victim-of-alleged-Uber...

edit: yes it happens in taxis too, but in that case it's pretty clear that the taxi company has liability. not so clear if it happens in an uber. see: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ellenhuet/2014/09/30/uber-driver...

Right, but a quick search also turns up numerous stories of traditional taxi drivers attacking/abusing passengers. I think it would be interesting to see statistically significant evidence that one model is demonstrably safer than the other.

I had a family member attacked by a cabbie. He was actually mere hours away from getting away with it too because a) The passenger had no record of the transaction and b) The cab service recycles their camera data every few days.

The way I see it, there is no guarantee of safety in either situation. You never know if your driver is a criminal or crazy. But services like Uber seem considerably more safe: There is extreme record keeping, user ratings, and no direct money changing hands.

Those things do happen in America, and have happened to me in America, in a "regulated" taxicab. The process for complaining takes forever, and is basically designed to get you to quit.

I think your entire argument breaks down because the Uber/Lyft experience is clearly substantially better than the offering you would apparently prefer (the current taxi scheme?).

The familiar statist's mantra: That red tape is preventing all hell from breaking loose!

I suppose if it weren't for government regulations we'd still be living in caves and dying at age 30.

> I suppose if it weren't for government regulations we'd still be living in caves and dying at age 30.

Probably not, but we might be living in rickety homes, eating food that's mainly sawdust, and working eighty hours per week for almost no money. Some of us would still be slaves. A few of us would be fantastically wealthy and powerful, but even they would be limited by living in a violent world populated by uneducated and over-exploited masses incapable of doing things like getting an education and finding their own passions that lead to innovation, invention, and creativity.

The pleasant life you live today is due to government regulations. You know how you can shop at the grocery store without fearing that something you buy might literally kill you? You know the drugs you take for headaches? For whatever ailments you have? It's nice knowing there's some science behind those, right? Nice knowing they won't kill you, right? Speed limits? Are they a good idea? You might be more likely to think so if you had kids and wanted to feel safe allowing them to play outside. Flying to an awesome tech conference anytime soon? You'd probably prefer the plane didn't drop out of the sky, right?

Etc.

> A few of us would be fantastically wealthy and powerful, but even they would be limited by living in a violent world populated by uneducated and over-exploited masses incapable of doing things like getting an education and finding their own passions that lead to innovation, invention, and creativity.

I'd like to point out that Harvard University precedes the United States by 140 years (1636 -> 1776), and the government before 1776 wasn't exactly "for the people".

What kind of students did Harvard have back then? Was it mainly rich upper class people, or people from "the people" too?

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_University, about Harvard (known then as New College):

Although never formally affiliated with any denomination, the early College primarily trained Congregationalist and Unitarian clergy.

Also notable is this list (note how many Ivies have been around since then): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Colonial_Colleges

In some cases that is true. Health and safety regulations have been instrumental in extending life expectancy. Building codes have been essential in creating safe habitable cities. Without those, we'd be dying in fire traps with dysentery and TB at 30.

<cynical non-USA-centric view> From _outside_ "your" healthcare and welfare systems, it appears that for a not insignificant number of people "living in caves and dying at age 30" is not some hyperbolic comparison to some distant neanderthal past - but something that's a lot closer to their reality that the privileges of the 1%...

(not that "government reguations" are "the good guy" here though...)

Fun fact: historically, placing someone outside the protection of the law was one of the most severe penalties governments could administer. Also cheap, because it means someone else -- whoever feels like it, basically -- carries out the execution without the government having to pay for it.

Perhaps you'd like that, though, since then the "statists" wouldn't be getting in your way with all those things that they claim are to "protect" you. And I'm sure you'd live to a ripe old age that way, yes?

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