Uber is essentially a criminal syndicate running unlicensed taxicabs and getting away with not obeying the law or paying their taxes because millennials will worship anything that comes with an app and can market itself as being “rebellious”.
They ought to be prosecuted under the RICO Act if they’re not going to start doing business on the up-and-up.
Why should Uber get a break? It’s supposed to be just another company doing business with the public. The public should be able to applaud, or complain, about the service, the company, and the employees.
Well, good luck explaining that to your auto insurance company when your Uber passenger is seriously injured or killed in an auto accident. IRCC, your policy does not cover this situation. It’s called the SOL clause.
And a bus is just a cruise ship without no buffet.
Uber is a business that employs drivers who transport, for a fare, people not known to them. They’re operating a taxi and/or livery car service, and they’re doing so without adhering to the laws that govern either.
There’s no question they’re violating the spirit of the various taxi licensing laws, but obviously whether they’re actually violating the letter of the law is at least a gray area given that they seem to be able to operate without being prosecuted in most markets. There are incidentally markets where the laws do explicitly prevent Uber from operating and so they don’t.
In a great many parts of the country the laws that govern taxi services serve the function more of providing a state-sanctioned monopoly to one or a handful of operators, not assuring a level of safety or service. In fact it does the opposite since it assures a non-competitive market. If Uber et al can get around those regulations with what amounts to a loophole or just flying under the enforcement radar, more power to 'em I say.
Sometimes a non-competitive market is in the public’s best interest, especially when it relates to inherently dangerous machines that pollute the environment and compete with mass transit.