But given that the USA's largest employer is using the government subsidized process

Instead of trying to alleviate this travesty with a new one — minimum wage — why not undo such subsidies? If somebody does not pay "enough" for your goods or services (including labor), people look for another buyer. And if they don't, then the pay is enough — by definition.

The government inserting itself between private parties willingly engaging in a lawful transaction is an abomination. That it is done under the pretext of fixing, what it broke in the first place, makes it worse.

This is a destruction of liberty and path to totalitarianism:

• We must help the poor!
• We must force everyone to be helping the poor.
• Now that we are helping the poor, we must control their lives to prevent them from doing "stupid" things. Depending on the kind of Statist in power, these may include:
  • no working for "too small" a wage
  • no drugs, tobacco, or alcohol
  • no sex out of wedlock
  • forced sterilizations and abortions
  • no usage of encryption to prevent monitoring your life
  • no driving "too fast"
  • forced medical treatments

All under the excuse, that we — the Collective — pay you, so you must do as we say. And, no, you can not opt-out either — our compassionate bleeding hearts would not allow you to make that stupid thing either.

As the definition of "poor" expands, the government's control of us all solidifies. Mandatory minimum wage is no different from NSA-spying and other manifestations of Collective (Glorious) trampling the rights of the Individual (cantankerous and unreasonable) — both are imposed on us "for our own good" by the people, who consider themselves our betters.

Are you saying they are more successful because blacks are inferior, or are you saying they are more successful for some other reason?

Just like you, I do not know the reasons. But I can see, that Asian Americans are more successful than White Americans, and White Americans — more successful than Black ones. It is evidenced in disproportional college admittance, arrest-records and other measures.

Whatever the reasons, the results are indisputable. Calling me "racist" over this is as stupid as blaming someone for stating, Blacks have more melanin in their skin...

I see you only responded to my assertion

Once again, my person is not the topic of this — nor any other forum on /. Not yet, anyway. Turning the conversation onto the person of your opponent is, by definition, an ad hominem attack. You automatically lose whatever the debate was about...

See why I said you wouldn't survive in an academic setting?

Darling, I handed your sorry ass back to you so many times already, I'm surprised, it is not yet falling off on its own. Or maybe it does? That would explain a thing or two...

Seek help — your obsession with my person, however illustrious, has already lead you to stalking — it is not healthy...

I certainly will not encourage you any more.

Governments worldwide that are marching to fascism want encryption banned.

Encryption is but a tiny side-show in the global march towards Collectivism — the coin, of which Fascism and Socialism are indistinguishable sides. As predicted long ago:

The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground.

— Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, Paris, May 27, 1788

It starts with concern for the poor, that inevitably causes the government to undertake support of the downtrodden with various "War on Poverty" initiatives.

A few decades and trillion-dollars into it, there are not only millions of recipients of the dole, there are also tens of thousands of government officials involved in distributing it. The combination makes it impossible to stop the foolish undertaking — it may be reformed and rearranged, but it can not be ended.

And then comes the idea, that, if we must support the unsuccessful among us, we should try to prevent them from doing (what we consider to be) stupid things: take drugs, drive too fast, eat fat (no, not fat, sugar!). Right here on Slashdot, the idea that our self-imposed responsibility for others allows us to control their actions, is alive and well.

And then government types begin to deliberately rearrange things to be able to attach their own strings to various incentives you can not refuse. The first example of this was, probably, the imposition of federal speed-limit by mandating, that States receiving federal Federal highway funds implement them.

The most recent example here is the federal take-over of education loans, which allows the Administration to better control, what the colleges teach and what students do. Because it raises the tuition costs so much, fewer and fewer students will be able to forgo such federal aid and will be forced to accept it — with all of the strings attached to them and the colleges they attend.

Compared to these aspects of the Collective increasingly controlling the Individual's life, use of encryption is of little to no consequence. Maybe, a new Republic in Antarctica, on the Moon or Mars will take the lessons of our errors to heart — the way our Founding Fathers studied those of the Romans...

So you are in favor of The government and industry conspiring to take your tax money.

While you are pulling accusations out from where the Sun don't shine, tovarisch, why not accuse him of being in favor of raping puppies? Sounds a lot more impressive and is just as well-substantiated...

You clearly believe black people are inferior.

Citation needed. Or would've been needed, if this article was about my (deeply flawed) person. It is not, so shove your little impotent vendetta where the sun don't shine and leave me alone. If you can...

so you have to wait for a bad thing to happen first before you will regulate it?

Is this your backwards way of admitting, the things you must fight to prevent has not happened yet — despite hundreds of thousands of Uber/Lyft drivers on the road for years?

Can you look at all of the incidents where underinsured

Not having enough insurance is a potential problem for everyone and everywhere — whether you ride in a car (be it hired, your own, or a friend's), or walking on the street, or cooking a steak. Why must Uber's drivers and passengers be singled-out for concern — and regulations to alleviate it?

(Please, try to respond in one posting.)

Darling, even when evidence is not to your little heart's liking, it is still evidence.

it sure looks like you hate black people, hate universities, hate Obama, hate towns that start their own broadband, and yeah, really hate black people!

Dats right mah man, mi be da racist for sure... Your grammar as wanting, though — in the context like this, the preposition "on" is mandatory: "hate on towns", "hate on Black people!", et cætera.

This is what you mean by hating!

No, actually, it is primarily the name-calling and the ad hominem arguments, that dywolf and yourself are so fond of (for lack of anything else), that I consider hateful.

BTW, given the diligent attention you pay to my posts, are you sure, you don't wish to subscribe to my newsletter?

so when you crash your uber car and the customer is badly injured and you don't have enough insurance

How is this hypothetical horror made different by it being "uber car" rather than "Fran Taylor's car"?

The "test" is a very simple one. Had the current technology existed, when the existing taxi-regulations were being created, would they have gotten created at all? To me the answer is an obvious "no" — with the information about rides and drivers available to consumers instantly 24x7, there is no need for the governments to "certify" drivers nor to weight in on the "fair" rates.

Consider this hypothetical example — suppose a wonder-pill was created, that eliminated all disease. Would we be seriously considering attempts to ban it out of concerns for unemployed doctors, unused hospitals, or that it can, sometimes, be taken in unsanitary conditions?

having some basic insurance to cover if things go wrong are pretty reasonable

Why must an Uber driver have a different insurance plan from you and me? Any reasons you can come up with are none of the government's concern — they are between the driver and his insurance company.

hard to think that having cheaper car services is such a compellingly necessary service that it can morally or ethically justify ignoring laws

Think of it as "civil disobedience". And note, that the broken laws are purely of the malum prohibitum kind for there is nothing unethical in the drivers' actions per se. If burning police cars and robbing private businesses can be "legitimate political strategy", any concern over Uber and Lyft for providing useful services at low costs is misplaced at least.