Lars Larson: Portland’s socialist tinkering with Uber

By Lars Larson
NW and national radio host,

The Northwest Nonsense

If you think only New York City suffers from socialism, check out the latest move by Portland.

City Hall proposes limits on how much money ride-share companies like Uber and Lyft get each time a passenger takes a trip.

Drivers claim 40 percent of the fare going to the company is too much.

They want the city government to confiscate some of what now goes to the company and give it to drivers.

That sounds a lot like Venezuela to me.

The folks who sit on city councils usually get there by failing in private business.

Letting folks with that track record decide how to divide up profits in a business seems worse than foolish.

Uber warns that if City Hall cuts its take in half…as council commissars Elana Pirtle-Guiney and Steve Novick have proposed, it means they’ll simply leave town.

Here’s some Econ 101…cut the supply of any service and the cost goes up.

I suggest City Hall get back to the things it already has on its plate…like crashing real estate values and out of control homelessness, drugs and crime…and leave private business alone.

That’s the Rose City Rap.  Join me at noon on KXL for 4 hours of Honestly provocative talk.  I’m Lars Larson