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Is this a joke? They are pouring money into building a monopoly, so they can raise prices when they eventually control urban and suburban transportation.



Whoosh! Yes, I meant it as satire, but I guess I my tone was too serious. There goes my career in comedy.

But on a more serious note, the arrogance of uber (and its backers) reminds me of times before the welfare state, before governments created barriers to unbridled capitalism. Those times were hard for the disempowered poor. If you were very rich, you could reclaim virtue by leaving your fortune to some public charity, or the church. Or you could be a patron for the arts, supporting writers and artists (that's why so many old novels are dedicated to rich patrons). Or you could pay to fund a piece of urban infrastructure, like a park or school.

That's the tone I was appealing to, but I ruined the joke by explaining it.

After the French revolution, then Bismarck's Germany, and finally post-WW1 Europe, the working class gained some power, and introduced some barriers to exploitation by the wealthy classes: barriers like unions, minimum wages, workplace safety regulations, environmental protection, and eventually taxpayer-funded medical care.

Since the 1970s, there has been a wave of corporate propaganda against these barriers. They have been called "unnecessary regulation" and "loss of personal freedom". Uber has adopted that attitude too. I think they are reactionaries who want to dismantle structures that help the working class.




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