To some extent this is true, but most of the automation I've witnessed in my lifetime led with direct cost savings. My main conclusion is that waymo's customers are more likely to be scared by other humans than they are to be price sensitive.

> most of the automation I've witnessed in my lifetime led with direct cost savings

Direct cost savings to the business or to the customer?

Waymo has been operating at an incredible loss for a very long time. They now have a product that people are willing to pay for and, in fact, find to be more comfortable—from OP's description it's basically a luxury Uber. Further, they expect to not be the only autonomous taxi system forever, competitors will eventually catch up.

Given that, I think it's only rational for them to operate at very high margins for as long as they can before competition drives the prices down. They probably won't come anywhere close to recouping the loss in that interval, but they'll get a head start on it.

Yep. They also probably don’t have that many waymo cars yet. I’m sure eventually they hope to blanket the city but for now, I assume they price rides such that supply = demand. If it was so cheap that everyone ordered them, you’d never get a car. That would be a really bad experience for customers and they would bounce. It’s incredibly hard to get someone to try your service a second time if their first experience was negative.