[korse]

The tech giants only capitulated because they think that there is a reasonable chance physical drivers will be unnecessary in the near future, thus making all of this a moot point.

This wouldn't have happened before Waymo's demonstrable successes.

[gnulinux996]

> only capitulated because

That seems to me an attempt to discredit union movements. Will you be explaining where are you getting this information from?

[korse]

This isn't an attempt to discredit union movements overall. This is a statement that a particular battle waged by a union was only won because corporate interests temporarily align with union goals. I've included my reasoning/narrative below if you're curious.

Uber, and I would assume the competition, have been chasing self driving fleets for years. This is well documented. Despite the market hype some years back, I think most sane executives understood how far off this technology was when the initial investment and subsequent divestment were made.

As you may remember, there were plenty of questions during this tumultuous period regarding the viability of self-driving tech. People wondered if it could even function at all within the foreseeable future.

Since the technology was so questionable, rideshares understandably wanted to increase earnings and lock in their competitive advantage. This required, among other things, fighting unionization tooth and nail.

Now that Waymo has done the hard part and proven that self driving tech actually works as a day-to-day service rideshares can start to rebuild some social capital before the creeping tide of automated taxi services makes any concessions moot. After all, they didn't build the automation and have always believed in a system that puts fairly compensated human drivers first.

[JumpCrisscross]

FTFA: “in exchange for the state drastically reducing expensive insurance coverage mandates protested by the companies.”

[potato3732842]

Kind of begs the question why the insurance was mandated at the level if was if paying some other party (ride share drivers in this case) marginally more accomplishes the same goal.

[philipallstar]

The point of companies is to provide value to customers, not employ employees. We are all customers. We all benefit from better services and lower prices. Anything that degrades either of those ambitions should not be celebrated.

[frankbreetz]

Pretty much all companies are created in order to make the owner(s) money.

[salawat]

You cannot make money if there is no one to spend money. Money is meant to move.

[gruez]

Money's just a means to an end, to secure resources for the owner. In a money-less society, jeff bezos would be just as happy if his customers paid him in rocket parts instead.

[iszomer]

That would be a quality control nightmare on his part to vet alone. And what's to say people still wouldn't "skim off the top" with or without money in society?

[philipallstar]

This is too vague. They're to make the owner(s) money by voluntary exchange of value with customers. They're not feudalism where the lord makes money off the serfs, who have no choice. It's not monarchy where..it's basically the same. It's not socialism, where the bureaucracy is enriched by the people it pretends to be a fair parent-surrogate to. It's just free interchange of value. And you can provide more value if your costs are lower.

[freejazz]

Really? There's probably a dozen or so well written books in the past year or two calling our current system neo-feudalism.

[philipallstar]

Drumming up support for a concept isn't evidence of very much, I'd say.

[freejazz]

Lol not everything is a coordinated effort to discount your opinion