This observation will consider the social, economic, cultural, moral, safety and legal significance of the issue that Uber has encountered. In addition, the stakeholders currently involved and those that will be involved in the future will be addressed. Finally, the impact of the issue and its urgency will be also considered.
Economic
According to Billy Gurley, the Board Director at Uber, the company’s unique competitive advantage is its dynamic pricing model (Uber para. 5). According to “Uber, Airbnb and Consequences of the Sharing Economy”, Uber is, first of all, the Hi-Tech company and its main objective is to become the mediator between customers and drivers (4). Therefore, the company unique value and creatively different approach will lose its meaning if it will be enforced to hire drivers as employees and provide with the compensations guaranteed by the law (Law para. 11).
From the point of view of economic issues, the stakeholders are the independent contract drivers, disabled customers, bank companies, competitors, and government. The impact of the issue and its urgency with regards to the above-mentioned stakeholders is the disruption of the current economic model. As a result, all the stakeholders mentioned above experience significant material losses under the influence of Uber commercial activity (Gallivan para. 7).
Social
The social impact of Uber can be evaluated as highly contradictory. On the one side, customers value the pricing alternative the service offers (Brishen para. 8). On the other side, customers as the members of society affected by the economic disruptions due to Uber’ activity suffer the loss.
The urgency of resolving the Uber issue is especially high with regards to the social impact that it has. Since, the wide social masses including the independent contract drivers, bank companies employees, competitors employees, and government are affected, Uber’s activity has created the problem of the national size.
Cultural and moral
Cultural and moral issues concerned by the Uber are closely connected with the social ones and concern the same stakeholders with the same urgency. However, their scope acquires new angles. For instance, Uber activity affects the problem of alcohol overconsumption because people get the safe and cheap way to get home after the night of drinking. Next, discrimination is another concern because the contract drivers are able to deny orders that they would not under the normal policies of the taxi companies (Rose para. 12).
Safety
Safety is another group of serious issues connected with Uber activity for a number of reasons. First of all, drivers do not get the necessary training. Next, they are not duly supervised before going to work and thus their physical preparedness for work is of question. Next, independently contracted drivers may have no skills for working with the disabled customers and this may also create additional safety hazards (Law para. 18).
Legal
Legal issues is the group of issues with as wide and as far-reaching scope as the economics and social concerns. This group is also in the closest connection with the political issues. The cause of this phenomenon is that the government is put into the situation where it is the main judge to regulate the activity of competitors and bring good order into the economy. However, the new model created by Uber does not fit the traditional practices. Therefore, it inevitably breaks the law and thus, it need to be readdressed to harmonize with the fragile economic balance created by the government (Brishen para. 31).
Works Cited
Brishen, Rogers. 2015. The Social Costs of Uber. Web.
Gallivan, Joseph. “Uber, Lyft Get the Green Light.”PortlandTribune.com. Caplin Media Group, 2015. Web.
Law, Steve. “City Not Quite Ready to Hitch a Ride with Uber.”Portland Tribune. Oregon Local News, 2015. Web.
Rose, Joseph. “Portland Cab Drivers Protest Uber, City Task Force with Taxi Caravan.” OregonLive.com. Oregonian News Network, 2015. Web.
“Uber, Airbnb and Consequences of the Sharing Economy: Research Roundup – Journalist’s Resource.” Journalists Resource. 2015. Web.
Uber. “The Company”. Uber.com. Web.