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So borrowing money from investors to compete with somebody is now a despicable thing To compete "in all cases", no. To compete against mom and pops -- that's

So borrowing money from investors to compete with somebody is now a despicable thing To compete "in all cases", no. To compete against mom and pops -- that's a different matter altogether. maybe even a crime? That's not what the commenter was saying.

smsm42 10y ago
Hotel business is not exactly "mom and pops" - at least not the majority of it. Neither is a taxi one when medallion is valued in hundreds of thousands of dollars. Moms and pops then are no more than hired labor for holder corporations. And deregulating it so they maybe can become owners instead would be great, but that's not happening. Uber is going around it because going directly against the medallion laws is not possible.
- kafkaesq 10y ago
  I was just attempting to clarify that the situation is more complex than simply "pro-" or "anti-competition". For example, medallion-based taxi services are both, simultaneously, soulless megacorps and franchises of (within a given association) many thousands of de-facto "mom and pops". If you have any doubts about this, ask a medallion holder how they go into the business (which I've done a fair amount of in various cities, in the past couple of years since Uber/Lyft got big). In effect a "medallion" is a lot like a permit to park your food truck in a certain place, or a lease on a corner store. And a lot of these people either invest their life savings (or sometimes the life savings of extended family members), and/or go very seriously into debt in order to purchase one of these "permits". And whose nest eggs Uber et al would very much like to "disrupt", at massive scale (literally in all corners of the globe) in order to validate their Weltanschaung (and of course, get stinking rich). Yes I know these services also bring (significantly) greater efficiency and experience, and perhaps better working conditions and financial security -- for some current medallion holders. But it would be naive to suppose that all of them stand to benefit; most likely there will be many losers as well -- by which I mean: bankrupted, in middle age, with a laughable pension and no savings -- before the dust settles.

smsm42 10y ago

Hotel business is not exactly "mom and pops" - at least not the majority of it. Neither is a taxi one when medallion is valued in hundreds of thousands of dollars. Moms and pops then are no more than hired labor for holder corporations. And deregulating it so they maybe can become owners instead would be great, but that's not happening. Uber is going around it because going directly against the medallion laws is not possible.

kafkaesq 10y ago
I was just attempting to clarify that the situation is more complex than simply "pro-" or "anti-competition". For example, medallion-based taxi services are both, simultaneously, soulless megacorps and franchises of (within a given association) many thousands of de-facto "mom and pops". If you have any doubts about this, ask a medallion holder how they go into the business (which I've done a fair amount of in various cities, in the past couple of years since Uber/Lyft got big). In effect a "medallion" is a lot like a permit to park your food truck in a certain place, or a lease on a corner store. And a lot of these people either invest their life savings (or sometimes the life savings of extended family members), and/or go very seriously into debt in order to purchase one of these "permits". And whose nest eggs Uber et al would very much like to "disrupt", at massive scale (literally in all corners of the globe) in order to validate their Weltanschaung (and of course, get stinking rich). Yes I know these services also bring (significantly) greater efficiency and experience, and perhaps better working conditions and financial security -- for some current medallion holders. But it would be naive to suppose that all of them stand to benefit; most likely there will be many losers as well -- by which I mean: bankrupted, in middle age, with a laughable pension and no savings -- before the dust settles.