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Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

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631–640 of 887 posts

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#631

Decoupling “benefits” like healthcare and retirement from employment is the real issue. Should be a government responsibility, given out equally, paid for by taxes.

We already have social security and medicare. The problem is that we refuse to expand these excellent social programs, opt to hobble them, and then point out how bad they are after we've bled them out. The American way.

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#632

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> national healthcare Let me anecdotally tell you that a large healthcare program has not been good in my experience. Single Payer maybe good though so long as there is choice and competition. Another consideration is that the US has been setup to allow a sort of localism where states can design their own solutions. It might be best for each system to be setup as a state level item.

Does that not ignore the massive disparity in population between states. In California the risk pool would be wide enough that it wouldn't be a problem, in states with < 1 million residents that suddenly becomes very difficult indeed.

Decent question, I'm not qualified to answer. Few, (none?) companies have 1M employees, how do they/insurance do it?

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#633

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could allowing the driver to see the destination before accepting the trip be used as a way to discriminate?

That is quite an abusive mentality to have. You would force someone to expose themselves to danger and the risk of violence and even death just so you could feel virtuous about yourself, while surely not at all exposing yourself to the same dangers you prescribe and force on others? It's really a rather twisted mentality to have; like typical aristocratic supremacist types that demand the disposable peasants serve th…

I don't get the aristocratic supremacist thing, the person hailing the ride is the one who is coming from or going to the "dangerous" area, clearly they are not a beneficiary of the aristocracy.

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#634

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problems? Sure. It's going to be hell to try and get in and out of the area, since you'll have to either go at about two miles an hour while people move out of the way (while regularly stopping and waiting for unorganized crowds), or just go around the long way. 'Getting dragged out of your car and beaten'? No, unless the police do it ( https://www.newsbreak.com/georgia/atlanta/news/1577488884462... ).

If you're going to include individual incidents, you should include the CHAZ/CHOP shooting, and the various "people beat up the car as it drives through" occurrences too. Sure, those cars may have done something to offend/anger/threaten the protesters, but...

> the CHAZ/CHOP shooting

The one where a man drove into protestors and shot one of them, or one of the four non-related-to-protest shootings in a neighborhood that had been suddenly abandoned by police and already had a high violent crime rate compared to the rest of the city?

> people beat up the car as it drives through

That's an inevitable result of somebody trying to push through a crowd that won't move. If you sit there, nobody moves out of the way, and you hit the gas anyway, people will inevitably try to damage the car to make you stop again, because you could kill somebody doing that.

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#635
post #94

Just make the whole service distributed. Cut out Uber. Connect me directly to a driver through open source software. Person A exists who is willing to drive from point a to point b for x price. I am willing to pay x price. An open source software exists to connect us both in real time. Who will the government regulate in this scenario?

Putting aside open vs closed source, what is the difference between Uber and the new service you are describing?

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#636

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, a terrible solution for drivers and riders both. Back to the taxi monopolies.

Or an opportunity for a new ride-share company that doesn't claim their employees are contractors.

How do you handle the uber drivers that do it as a little side gig. Like less than 10 hours a week?

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#638
> Becerra said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday that he was unconcerned about the potential for Uber to leave the state as a result of the order. “Any business model that relies on shortchanging workers in order to make it probably shouldn’t be anywhere, whether California or otherwise,” he said.

This type of attitude drives me crazy. These companies have paid billions of dollars to drivers, who voluntarily decided to work and earn this money. If drivers felt the arrangement was unfair, wouldn't they do something else? How is anyone better off by these companies being legislated out of existence? They're already hemorrhaging cash as is.

It's astonishing to me that government leaders believe workers are better off with fewer options, regardless of the perceived quality of them. Or maybe they don't actually believe it but are willing to inflict the damage anyway for the sake of virtue signaling.

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#639
I've been bearish on Uber recently when they fleeced me with their credit card rewards recently. That barclaycard used to offer straight cash back, 4% at bars being the big one, which made it one of the best credit cards out there.

Then one day I checked my rewards balance and lo and behold, it was converted into useless uber bux that I can only spend on uber eats, which I avoid given the premium, or rides, which I am not going to ever do unless I've been inoculated for covid 19.

Very slimy anti consumer and anti driver practices, and I hope this statewide pull out means the writing is finally on the wall for Uber. I lust for the day ever since they ruined my favorite credit card.

Re: Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California

#640

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is horrible for customers, the worst part is when drivers don't want to pick you up.

I think it's going to depend by area. The last time I tried to use Uber to get a ride from the airport, I had several drivers accept, then call me - "I'm all the way in midtown, it'll take me 45 minutes to get to you, you probably want to cancel this." The incentives for drivers have always been fucked. I'd rather the drivers not accept my ride than try to play a weird game of chicken to get me to cancel when I'm try…

I never had that at the airport but my contingency plan for the times when drivers decided not to show in an obvious attempt to get me to cancel was to pull up the other ride sharing app and then use that, and leave the original one running.
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