But Uber isn't exactly a beacon of fair business practices, and in all appearances seem anti-regulation overall, even the ones that are pro-consumer.
This is a bad position with no easy way out. Clearly the current regulations aren't working, but the only two players in the game support either near-total deregulation, or complete stagnancy. There is no actively engaged party that represents the "we should probably regulate less but not throw out the baby with the bathwater" side.
The government will respond to whoever exerts the most pressure (whether that's a vindication of democracy or an example of its failure is another discussion) - but the only two parties exerting pressure are both fairly evil in my books.
1) Government gets free (non-taxing) income from the cab drivers.
2) Government officials have to deal with a voting bloc (and potential strikes) if they don't comply.
3) Cab drivers get to limit supply, and all the advantages that brings, like for example not paying 2%-5% of the fare to the card companies, plus paying $1000 a month to the banks for having a payment terminal at all (not, of course, including the separate cell subscription the payment terminal needs) (yes I know the situation in America is slightly better, but ...)
4) Let's face facts here, regular people don't, or very rarely, use cabs because of the price of that service. So they don't have an incentive to go against this.
5) There is some limited value to the regulations : they are probably overkill, but they do keep out bad drivers. Bad as in criminals, and bad as in drunk and so on.
Bottom line : this is a problem with the democratic system itself, and specifically a point where it doesn't agree with what the tech scene wants. Tesla has effectively the same problem.
Uber and Lyft are able to get traction because the government is being too slow to meet the demands people have within their cities/states. Regulation is good for consumer protection, but when it's preventing services to reach consumers, there is a problem. These companies are willing to go around the laws cause the government is not doing their job.