The bulk of Uber's ~$2 million/year of political spending in New York goes towards ad campaigns [1]. The taxi lobby bought the mayor and City Council; Uber created a grassroots backlash. This was the balance. Then Uber burned off its teflon coating.
Since Lyft never bothered with politics and Juno/Gett is so young, the balance broke and we got this mess.
[1] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/uber-spent-1-2m-lob...
I think we come away with quite different reactions to the same facts: I view it as telling that Uber spent roughly four times what the taxi lobby spent, but most of the conversational focus regarding spending targets the taxi lobby - one of many widespread biases in which some bits of the for-hire transportation debate get more frequently talked about and others usually overlooked.
The (legitimately real) rank and file support and skewed discussion focus which Uber's ad/lobbying money has bought them isn't my idea of grassroots backlash, even if it unwittingly enlists the grassroots in their PR campaign.
No doubt the taxi lobby is pushing their interests just like Uber pushes theirs. Neither set of industry lobbyists is truly looking out for the citizens.
But when the conversation they've shaped pairs "bought the mayor and City Council" for the less-spending party with "created a grassroots backlash" for the more-spending party, I can only marvel impressed and saddened at Uber PR's effectiveness.
In most cities, the local taxi lobby plus the citizens who oppose Uber/Lyft/Juno/Gett for normal public policy reasons are even more outclassed against a major VC-funded global would-be monopolist like Uber than NYC managed. I'm impressed at de Blasio and City Council for holding firm.
(As you can tell, I'm no fan of these companies for several reasons, but explaining those reasons substantively would be a huge tangent.)
Uber spent four times as the taxi lobby spent on a single politician. I don't know what the taxi industry's total is. Given they shower tens of thousands of dollars on even state senators [1], I'd wager it's comparable to Uber's.
[1] https://nypost.com/2018/01/27/taxi-committee-head-got-thousa...
(Big apples to big apples, maybe, given the city in question?)
I can no longer edit my grandparent comment to account for your correction, so this will have to do.
But if public opinion is mobilized as a weapon through very selective presentation of the issues in ads, in a disproportionate way that leaves the public with a skewed picture of the pros and cons, it has the same indirect effect of pressuring the politicians to act in the company's interests. The public can't react in their own interests if they don't have the right facts, so then polls will legitimately show what the company wants, by and large.
Roughly the same problem arises if they fund a heavy "lobby your elected officials" campaign, targeted only at their supporters, with no equivalent resources mobilizing those who disagree - and indeed they did this.
Not sure where bribery entered the conversation. The person I was replying to said that Uber spent $2 million / year on legal expenditures to affect the debate in NY, mostly through advertising.
I have no reason to assume that this was any more bribery than PR campaigns and lobbying generally are, and indeed I presume it didn't go beyond that.
The mention of the taxi lobby having "bought" de Blasio and the City Council was from the comment I was replying to, which I quoted to marvel at the tone of the conversation which Uber has managed to shape so favorably.
And the public support which I said Uber has "bought" is, as I noted, "legitimately real" - they just fed skewed information to the public, which is not a bribe.
(They do give lots of loss-leader promotional incentives to make people use and like their service, but we usually categorize that as marketing and not bribery without elements that are absent here.)
