#cat system-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation release 6.4 (Santiago)

#yum list firefox
Installed Packages
firefox.x86_64 24.4.0-1.el6_5 @RHEL-64-x86_64-updates

Go to firefox.com and see 'Congrats! You're using the latest version of Firefox.'

Of course it makes sense. Insurance rates are based on risk. Are you claiming that a car that is on the road all day long, in very congested conditions, making frequent stops to pick up/drop off passengers has no more risk of being in a collision than any other vehicle?

Cab fares are regulated in NYC. Competition has nothing to do with it. http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/ht...

You do realize there may be people injured in an accident who are not customers of Uber, right?

Make sure your new numbers are at least plausible, unlike your old numbers.

Lets use your example of Ford. Ford had an EBITDA of around $16B last year. According to your numbers, the labor force only made about 10% of that, or $1.6B dollars. Assume that all value paid to the employees is in the form of cash (no benefits at all). Ford employs around 224,000 people. By your calculation, the average Ford employee made only $7142 last year. Does that sound even remotely possible to you? All those union production workers, engineers, designers, equipment techs, IT personnel, management, etc made on average $7142, with no benefits at all. You are off by at least a factor of 10, which means the employees keep at LEAST 50% of the value they produce, and often quite a bit more than that.

From HBO. Of course, it will cost many millions of dollars, but then you own it and can do whatever you want with it.

Your numbers are completely ficticious and way out of line with reality. What real business has a profit number that is 11X its labor cost? Think of a business like Google - almost all of it's expense is labor. Unless Google's net profit margin is above 50% (and it is not) the employees are keeping more of their 'value' than the company is.

If your numbers were in any way true, there would be no need for companies to control labor costs - they make up less than 9% of the cost. Any cost-cutting measures that targetted something other than labor would be far more effective than targetting labor costs.

I think you need to re-examine who needs to offer a competing product. Complete this sentence: without Aereo, broadcasters and cable companies deliver programming - without broadcasters, Aereo delivers ________

You can't go into a store, steal a bunch of stuff, sell it on the street, and seriously claim that the stores should offer 'competing product'.

Ha-ha! Good one! You are saying if you were to develop a game as described, some big mean company could just buy you out without your consent?

The companies get bought because they are grubbing for money just like everyone else.

No. First, to run afoul of anti-trust laws you first need to be a trust, which Sony isn't. Second, tying has nothing to do with co-reqs or pre-reqs. If it did, then every game Sony sells would be claimed to be 'tied' to purchase of a PS. Third, tying is requiring purchase of an unrelated thing in order to get the desired thing, for anti-competitive reasons. For example, if Sony had a monopoly (they don't) and the only way you could get a game was if you also bought 'the official game guide', that could be seen as tying, because the purpose of it is to get people to buy a Sony game guide so they don't buy someone else's. None of that applies here.

I didn't say 'be liable', I said 'pay'. There is a huge difference. I can 'be liable' for $1M, but if I only have $500 in assets there is no way someone is getting $1M from me.

This thread is about people who think it is unreasonable to have laws such as requiring cab drivers to have insurance. In the absense of such laws, how is the driver going to face criminal charges?

First, it is illegal to drive without insurance. Do people do it? Of course. Is it generally condoned by society? No. So why should it be OK for someone who wants to be a cab driver to drive without sufficient insurance?

Second, you do realize that everyone, through increased insurance rates, pays for the cost of those uninsured drivers, right? So why should all of society be forced to pay for to supposed 'right' of someone to drive an uninsured cab? I see no positive benefit to that at all.

No, it should not be quck and easy to do that. Cities have too much congestion already. Limiting the number of cabs is a good thing, as it both limits the number of cars, and increases the cost of cars so that public transport is cheap in comparison. More people riding public transport lowers pollution, etc.

The second point is that most people do NOT have insurance that covers driving for hire. That insurance is considerably more expensive, and thus will raise the cost of a ride, probably to the point where it is no longer profitable (which is why Uber is saying having to do that would make the service 'not viable'.)

Answer the question: who pays to cover the pedestrian? One option is the driver. Of course, if the driver has little assets (and chances are he would not be driving a cab if he was rich), he can't pay. The only other person involved in this wonderful libertarian world would be the passenger. But, of course, HE couldn't be expected to pay. So that leaves only two choices: either the pedestrian himself is responsible for all his bills (including loss of income, etc), or all of society pays (either through the goverment, or through higher insurance rates for everyone). And if random people and/or all of society are going to have to cover the cost of damage inflicted by a cab driver, then all of society damn well has a right to insist, through (gasp) regulations, that the driver of a cab must demonstrate the financial wherewithall to pay for damage he potentially causes (usually by purchasing insurance).

Your 'friend' example is stupid, because drivers ARE required to carry insurance. If they don't have insurance, society covers the cost, but the driver has violated a law.

Libertarian chooses unregulated cab. Said unregulated cab hits pedestrian. Insurance company of unregulated cab says 'your policy is for personal use only, we are not paying'. Who pays for pedestrian's injuries, the libertarian?