You might not have thought that a taxi service would move onto center stage in our great political debates. But Uber actually is looking like a surprisingly important political issue. Why?
Well, Uber actually brings two things to the taxi market. One is the smartphone revolution, letting you tap a screen instead of standing out in the rain waving your arm, and cursing the guy who darts out half a block from you and snags the cab you were trying to hail.
The other is the company whose workers supposedly are free contractors, not employees, exempting the company from most of the regulations designed to protect employee interests. And it’s the second aspect that brings us into divisive politics.
On one side, Republicans are eager to dismantle as many worker protections as they can. So from their point of view Uber’s not-our-problem approach to workers would be desirable independent of the technology.
On the other side, we’re recently seen the emergence of the “new liberal consensus“, which argues (based on a lot of evidence) that wages are much less rigidly determined by supply and demand than previously thought, and that public policy can and should nudge employers into paying more. If that’s your policy plan, you really don’t want to see employers undermine it by declaring that they aren’t really employers.
It’s surely possible to separate these two issues, to promote the use of new technology without prejudicing the interests of workers. But progressives need to work on doing that, and not let themselves get painted as enemies of innovation.