4 ms·

We were told the same thing about cabs, and hotels. And even though AirBnB and Uber exist, the world is fine. Personally I even prefer a world where I can Uber

We were told the same thing about cabs, and hotels. And even though AirBnB and Uber exist, the world is fine. Personally I even prefer a world where I can Uber from my AirBnB to a sidewalk cafe and have a glass of wine.

wolverine876 5y ago
So no regulations are valid, because you found a few to be invalid? > We were told the same thing about cabs ... and Uber exist, the world is fine. Lots of traffic problems in major cities due to giving Uber unlimited public resource capacity, rather than using the free market to bid it out (which is what medallions are, if I understand correctly). Did the world blow up? Is that our standard for success? The world of many medallion owners blew up because Uber bought off government and propagandized the public to give them for free what others have to pay for. > Airbnb Regulated in many/most cities.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > using the free market to bid it out that's pushing the use of "the free market" quite a bit. Cities control the supply of medallions. The fact that people can bid whatever they want for them doesn't make it a "free market".
  - johannes1234321 5y ago
    we don't have any true free market. All our markets have limits due to some form of restriction. Even without medallions there would be resgrictions due to road space etc. but withinnthe framework society decided on thr medallions give a market.
  - tekromancr 5y ago
    The alternative is letting a few monied lords gobble up the commons and rent it back out.
    - HPsquared 5y ago
      That's what happens with medallions.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      The traditional, centuries or even millenia-old way of dealing with the commons was a set of customs and practices that resisted both the monied lords and the indigent local fool. These were resilient across an extraordinary long time, but the way in which industrial capitalism leveraged and facilitated greed defeated most of them, leading (in the late 20th century) to a belief in "the tragedy of the commons" and very confused thinking about how a commons could function.
  - TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
    Doing medallions create artificial scarcity?
    - wolverine876 5y ago
      > Doing medallions create artificial scarcity? If you mean 'Don't mediallions ...', no. They take a real scarcity, road space (and pollution capacity) and shift it from an externality, something an entity consumes and but doesn't pay for, to something they do pay for.
  - wolverine876 5y ago
    > that's pushing the use of "the free market" quite a bit. Cities control the supply of medallions. The fact that people can bid whatever they want for them doesn't make it a "free market". Why not? Every market and auction is premised on limited resources. There is limited road space, which is auctioned off in the form of tokens, which are the mediallions.
    - barnabee 5y ago
      Medallions clearly don’t represent road space but a specific use. They basically create a taxi cartel with a high price of entry. I could get behind auctioning off all road space to limit traffic and pollution but not that.
      - wolverine876 5y ago
        > Medallions clearly don’t represent road space but a specific use. Why do you say that? It's not clear to me, especially sans any support.
- bee_rider 5y ago
  Airbnb also drives up rent and housing costs. It is actually pretty funny that they managed to pick two of the most well known "evading regulatory oversight to harm communities for fun and profit" companies out there.
underwater 5y ago
That doesn't make you anti-regulation. It just means you are optimising for your personal benefit.
stemlord 5y ago
Uber and Lyft are both far more expensive than yellow cabs ever were in NYC, and it's now usually very difficult to hail a yellow cab. I'd say Uber royally fucked up that system.

wolverine876 5y ago

So no regulations are valid, because you found a few to be invalid? > We were told the same thing about cabs ... and Uber exist, the world is fine. Lots of traffic problems in major cities due to giving Uber unlimited public resource capacity, rather than using the free market to bid it out (which is what medallions are, if I understand correctly). Did the world blow up? Is that our standard for success? The world of many medallion owners blew up because Uber bought off government and propagandized the public to give them for free what others have to pay for. > Airbnb Regulated in many/most cities.

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
> using the free market to bid it out that's pushing the use of "the free market" quite a bit. Cities control the supply of medallions. The fact that people can bid whatever they want for them doesn't make it a "free market".
- johannes1234321 5y ago
  we don't have any true free market. All our markets have limits due to some form of restriction. Even without medallions there would be resgrictions due to road space etc. but withinnthe framework society decided on thr medallions give a market.
- tekromancr 5y ago
  The alternative is letting a few monied lords gobble up the commons and rent it back out.
  - HPsquared 5y ago
    That's what happens with medallions.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    The traditional, centuries or even millenia-old way of dealing with the commons was a set of customs and practices that resisted both the monied lords and the indigent local fool. These were resilient across an extraordinary long time, but the way in which industrial capitalism leveraged and facilitated greed defeated most of them, leading (in the late 20th century) to a belief in "the tragedy of the commons" and very confused thinking about how a commons could function.
- TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
  Doing medallions create artificial scarcity?
  - wolverine876 5y ago
    > Doing medallions create artificial scarcity? If you mean 'Don't mediallions ...', no. They take a real scarcity, road space (and pollution capacity) and shift it from an externality, something an entity consumes and but doesn't pay for, to something they do pay for.
- wolverine876 5y ago
  > that's pushing the use of "the free market" quite a bit. Cities control the supply of medallions. The fact that people can bid whatever they want for them doesn't make it a "free market". Why not? Every market and auction is premised on limited resources. There is limited road space, which is auctioned off in the form of tokens, which are the mediallions.
  - barnabee 5y ago
    Medallions clearly don’t represent road space but a specific use. They basically create a taxi cartel with a high price of entry. I could get behind auctioning off all road space to limit traffic and pollution but not that.
    - wolverine876 5y ago
      > Medallions clearly don’t represent road space but a specific use. Why do you say that? It's not clear to me, especially sans any support.
bee_rider 5y ago
Airbnb also drives up rent and housing costs. It is actually pretty funny that they managed to pick two of the most well known "evading regulatory oversight to harm communities for fun and profit" companies out there.

underwater 5y ago

That doesn't make you anti-regulation. It just means you are optimising for your personal benefit.

stemlord 5y ago

Uber and Lyft are both far more expensive than yellow cabs ever were in NYC, and it's now usually very difficult to hail a yellow cab. I'd say Uber royally fucked up that system.