In many places around the world, commercial or taxi driver's licenses require additional medical and background checks compared to a regular license, plus taxis require additional insurance.

E.g., UK https://www.gov.uk/taxi-driver-licence/outside-london; Germany https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%BChrerschein_zur_Fahrgast...

Taxi drivers had background checks,

Uber and Lyft have background checks across the board. They also had a higher insurance policy ($1M standard) than most cab companies ever did...

They also carry appropriate insurance and have stricter punishments over traffic violations including DUIs.

> have stricter punishments over traffic violations

That certainly doesn't stop them from speeding, cutting you off, going straight from right turn lanes and generally driving very aggresively. Cab drivers are really one of the worst when it comes to following traffic rules, second only to urban bicyclists.

Soo... because they aren't being punished after registering with law enforcement, I shouldn't have to register at all?

No, what I’m saying is if law is not being enforced, it’s useless, and so pointing at it as some kind of advantage of taxis over Uber is severely misguided.

Individual taxi companies are in charge of doing background checks on their drivers, same as Uber & Lyft