By Rainer Lempert, Senior Policy Scientist, and Julia Wunsch, Public Policy Manager
Across the US, riders are paying more than they should. In some places, they are being priced out of rideshare entirely. Mounting local fees, costly insurance mandates, and poorly designed pay rules are driving up prices and reducing access to an essential service. The challenges seen in Seattle reflect a national trend: We estimate that Uber riders in the US are overpaying more than 2 billion dollars a year due to overly expensive insurance, excessive pay standards, and government or airport fees.
When transportation becomes unaffordable, people lose access to jobs, healthcare, and education, and communities become less vibrant and connected. Policymakers have an opportunity to ensure regulation supports affordability and access rather than limits it. Thoughtful rules that keep fees reasonable — and apply them fairly across all modes, including taxis and private cars — can strike the right balance of raising revenue while preserving affordability. Likewise, overly rigid earnings standards and problematic insurance rules don’t just raise prices for riders; they also reduce demand and opportunity for drivers. Smart regulation can keep rideshare affordable and sustainable for both riders and drivers alike.
Where Regulations are Driving Up Fares
It would be reasonable to assume that rideshare costs simply mirror broader cost-of-living trends. But in some outlier markets, rideshare prices reflect more than cost of living alone; layers of regulation are pushing fares up even higher.
Looking at the most expensive markets in the country — the red outliers above the trend line in the chart — we see that all are places with one or more of the issues we noted above: excessive fees or damaging pay rules (Seattle and New York City), or expensive insurance (Las Vegas and Los Angeles). Uber fares in these markets cost, on average, 1.6x what they do in markets with a similar cost of living but a lower regulatory burden (Austin, Miami, Boston, and Honolulu).
Comparing these cities by the local cost of living also shows the clear mismatch between living costs and rideshare fares. In the most expensive markets (New York City and Honolulu), riders see very different fares despite similarly high living costs due to added fees and pay rules. We also see more expensive rideshare in other over-regulated markets with relatively lower cost of living like Las Vegas, while cities like Miami and Austin — where policymakers have generally guarded against overregulation — see more affordable rideshare prices.
Primary Drivers of Expensive Rideshare
The data shows that over-regulated markets are outliers where rideshare costs are well above what the local cost of living would suggest. A closer look shows why: fees, insurance mandates, and pay standards are stacking costs from every direction.
Taxes and Fees
Cities, counties, states, and airports increasingly layer fees on rideshare — often more than on any other industry. Today, nearly 30% of all U.S. trips have at least one fee, and that number continues to grow each year.
At airports, it’s almost impossible to take an Uber without paying an added surcharge. In most cases, Uber riders pay a higher airport fee than taxi customers, while personal vehicles often pay nothing at all.
As shown in the receipts above from New York and Seattle, multiple layers of local fees apply to a single trip and may add up to more than five separate charges. As a result, riders are stuck with fees that make up a large portion of the total fare. In New York City and Seattle, fees in the sample receipts above increase the total rider payment by over 23% and 17%, respectively.
Insurance
Excessive government-mandated insurance requirements for TNCs are also driving up fares for riders across the U.S. Uber maintains insurance for trips on the app, and some states require coverage levels far higher than what’s mandated for taxis, limousines, or personal vehicles.
In states like New York (excluding NYC) and New Jersey with very high insurance requirements, around 30% of a rider’s fare on average goes toward state-mandated insurance costs, as of September 2025. More than half of these costs stem from excessive Uninsured/Underinsured Motorist (UM/UIM) coverage that applies when other drivers are at fault.
A December 2025 Berkeley Research Group study, commissioned by Uber and Lyft, found that New Jersey’s $1.5 million UM/UIM rules were unnecessary for most accidents and did little to improve safety. Instead, the policy incentivized litigation and contributed to a systemic issue of legal abuse, with fraudulent claims and inflated settlements further driving up costs. Lawmakers and voters need to take up this issue and pass reforms, as California did recently with SB 371.
Pay Regulations
Despite the harms of Seattle’s rules to riders, drivers, and businesses that we documented in our previous blog post, cities continue to propose rules mimicking Seattle’s failure. But an alternative exists, where additional protections and access to affordable services don’t have to be at odds with each other. Where rules are balanced, more people can rely on rideshare, driver earnings are protected, and trips grow.
California and New York state show that this is possible. Both have strong earnings safeguards that set fair minimum rates over a biweekly period, giving platforms the flexibility to adjust prices for different trips while ensuring drivers consistently earn above the required floor. In California, biweekly earnings per active hour for drivers and couriers must be at least 20% above the minimum wage and include an additional $0.36 per mile. In New York state, driver earnings must be at least $26 per active hour — well above the state minimum wage. Policymakers in these states have proven that fair pay and real protections for drivers can go hand in hand with affordable services.
The Value of Keeping Rideshare Within Reach
This pattern of overregulation has consequences far beyond the rideshare industry. It adds to the affordability challenges already facing many cities.
In 2025, 36% of Uber trips began or ended in underserved areas, and research shows that rideshare is especially essential for lower-income households that have limited access to public transit and lower rates of car ownership. As fees and regulations push prices higher, they function like a regressive tax: placing the greatest burden on those who can least afford it and depend on rideshare the most.
Connecting Patients to Care
These policies don’t just hurt individual riders; they also increase expenses for government programs, reducing access for the people who need rides most. Through Uber Health, hospitals, clinics, and public agencies provide non-emergency medical transportation to patients who might otherwise miss care. Today, Uber Health partners with more than 4,000 healthcare organizations, facilitating millions of trips each month to doctors’ offices, clinics, and hospitals. Since 2022, our partnership with the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has helped nearly 40,000 veterans take over 250,000 rides, saving taxpayers almost $200 million in avoided missed appointments through mid-2024. 83% of veterans surveyed by the VHA said that without the VHA-Uber Health Connect initiative, they would have missed their appointment.
Uber also works with community-based programs serving seniors and people with disabilities who rely on affordable rides to reach checkups, treatments, and recovery services. Each new fee or mandate cuts into the funding for these programs and limits access to care.
Safer Roads for Everyone
Higher costs also threaten the broader public safety benefits that rideshare provides. Independent research has consistently found that Uber’s presence reduces drunk driving and saves lives. A 2021 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that after Uber entered Houston, alcohol-related crash traumas fell 24 percent on weekend nights and 39 percent among people under 30, alongside declines in DUI arrests. A 2023 Review of Economics and Statistics study found that Uber reduced overall traffic fatalities by 5.2 percent nationwide, saving an estimated 627 lives in 2019 alone, a safety benefit valued at nearly $6.8 billion per year.
“The choice to drink responsibly includes education, planning ahead, and understanding the negative consequences that can result from unsafe and irresponsible decisions. One of the safest decisions people can make is planning for a safe ride home. Fewer rideshare options, or none at all, in addition to fee and price increases could result in more people choosing to drive when they’re under the influence.”
— Kelly Poulsen, Senior Vice President of Government Relations, Responsibility.org
An Essential Service Moving Cities
Rideshare has become a part of how cities move, with three in four Americans saying it is an essential service they rely on to get where they need to go. Yet growing layers of local fees, costly insurance mandates, and rigid pay rules are driving up prices — reducing access for working families, earnings for drivers, and funding for healthcare and community programs that depend on affordable rides.
Rideshare supports low-car and transit-connected lifestyles. When prices rise, riders switch to private cars more than they switch to public transit, increasing congestion and emissions.
By recognizing rideshare’s public value, policymakers can expand access to safe, reliable and sustainable transportation that strengthens local economies, improves public safety and keeps cities connected and vibrant.
A National Trend of Driving Up Rideshare Prices and Limiting Access was originally published in Uber Under the Hood on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.