If Lyft can't keep its drivers as independent contractors, it may never be profitable

Lyft's entire business model is predicated on its relationship with its drivers. It hinges on recruiting them, keeping them happy, ensuring the company never has to provide them health insurance and other benefits, and eventually finding a way to replace some of them with self-driving cars so Lyft can keep a bigger chunk of the check after every ride. Unfortunately for Lyft there is great uncertainty at each juncture of that driver relationship. In filings last week initiating a planned initial public stock offering, Lyft -- which lost $911.3 million on $2.2 billion in revenue in 2018 -- acknowledged it may never become profitable. That's due in part to both long-standing limitations and new external threats that have left Lyft's relationship with its drivers in flux.