3 ms·

Let's call it what it really is - rent They're rentseeking

• quesera 3y ago
  That's not what rent-seeking means. They're just charging exorbitant fees to a customer base with no alternatives. Like prison phone companies.
  • dragonwriter 3y ago
    > That's not what rent-seeking means. > They’re just charging exorbitant fees to a customer base with no alternatives. The term for that is “monopoly rent”, it is a subtype of economic rents (which are distinct from, but overlap, “rents” of goods or services for a finite time as distinct from sales.) Actions taken in pursuit of economic rents are called “rent-seeking”.
    • quesera 3y ago
      Rent-seeking is profiting from position without adding value. Rent-seeking is not merely pricing your product as high as the market will bear. Ticketmaster adds value. They just charge exorbitant fees. ... Edit: But OK, you can argue that their full vertical integration (ticketing-venue-artist management) is maximizing their position for the furtherance of increasing their fees, and that would be rent-seeking. I don't see it that way, but I won't argue against interpreting them as a coercive monopolist, which is close enough.
      • dragonwriter 2y ago
        > Rent-seeking is profiting from position without adding value. No, that's “economic rent”, of which monopoly rent is an extensively-studied subtype. (Monopoly is position.) Rent-seeking is pursuing economic, including monopoly, rents.