<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>sschueller</author><text>So you have a profitable company but at what cost? These drivers are working at slave wages unable to pay into any retirement funds or have health insurance.&lt;p&gt;In countries where there was a reasonable taxi system uber gutted them and went around regulations taking away the few guarantees the people had like a retirement and sick leave.&lt;p&gt;In the end we the tax payer have to help these people down the road when they get sick or old and all of this for the profit of a few share holders.&lt;p&gt;In Switzerland Uber still owes drivers half a billion Swiss Francs in unpaid wages&amp;#x2F;retirement and sick leave. Where do people think this missing money will come from when these people need it later on in life?</text><parent_chain><item><author>agentofoblivion</author><text>I remember reading plenty of thought pieces a few years ago saying this was impossible, and that Uber was a house of cards gaining market share by subsidizing rides with investor money.  That there were no economies of scale to bring costs down, etc., etc.  I would love to see a &amp;quot;what we got wrong, and what we still have right&amp;quot; post from one of these people, but I won&amp;#x27;t hold my breath.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Uber posts first quarterly net profit</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-q2-earnings-report-2023-453c335a</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>altacc</author><text>Maybe wait and see if it really is a sustainable business first. Making a profit for 1 quarter after 50 quarters of loses whilst having over $9 billion of debt isn&amp;#x27;t strong proof that it will be profitable from now on. The numbers are positive though, it doesn&amp;#x27;t seem to be just a bookkeeping profit as they have a good rise in revenue &amp;amp; use. Personally I think if they keep running a tighter ship than they did pre-pandemic they might make a sustainable profit. Using profits for buybacks and dividends will be more attractive to shareholders than paying off debts as that&amp;#x27;s what most have been waiting for.</text><parent_chain><item><author>agentofoblivion</author><text>I remember reading plenty of thought pieces a few years ago saying this was impossible, and that Uber was a house of cards gaining market share by subsidizing rides with investor money.  That there were no economies of scale to bring costs down, etc., etc.  I would love to see a &amp;quot;what we got wrong, and what we still have right&amp;quot; post from one of these people, but I won&amp;#x27;t hold my breath.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Uber posts first quarterly net profit</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-q2-earnings-report-2023-453c335a</url></story>