This is a very possible outcome, but not the only realistic one. Depending on the rate of development/adoption of autonomous vehicles there may still be a future without deprived drivers and selling at a loss.
In any case, I am glad for the more efficient use of space and energy that Uber has provided over the congestion of roaming and standing taxicabs in the downtown core with service virtually nowhere else.
Uber and similar ride-hailing services have not led to more efficient space or energy use. On the contrary, these services have led to serious and alarming increases in congestion and pollution and diverted funds away from public transit.
The real economics of taxi services, for example round trip costs for servicing lower density out-lying regions, implies much higher prices and lower ride inventory.
Uber and others providing an inflated amount of inventory at unsustainably low prices is not some sort of shift in transit patterns. It’s nothing but temporarily selling a dollar for fifty cents in order to compel all competitors out of the market, at which point it instantly goes right back to being just as hard to get an Uber in the suburbs as it was to get a taxi there in the 90s, because that’s precisely how the price equilibrium of that supply and demand always worked.
In any case, I am glad for the more efficient use of space and energy that Uber has provided over the congestion of roaming and standing taxicabs in the downtown core with service virtually nowhere else.