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I realize that most people here thin medallions were always a and idea, bad for consumers and should die. But, the fact is that they do exist and were promoted
by netcan 12y ago
I realize that most people here thin medallions were always a and idea, bad for consumers and should die.
But, the fact is that they do exist and were promoted by the municipal government (this is a municipal government system, isn't it?). Even if it was a bad idea, aren't they responsible for it? They sold or issued medallions on the grounds that they are a resellable perpetual license to run a taxi. If i'm not mistaken, the city made money selling them.
Unless you consider the whole "contract" void, I can think of only two logical perspective. Either the city is violating that contract by allowing uber to operate or uber is a new kind of service with no bearing on that contract. IE if segways had replaced cabs, tough luck #1 sounds prohibitively expensive to accept & #2 sounds dishonest.
- icebraining 12y agoI think that question is perfectly valid; even if the contracts are considered unfair/rent-seeking or whatever, why shouldn't the city be at least partly responsible for issuing such contracts? There's an article on Cato about the issue, which focuses on the economic efficiency of the issue: http://www.cato.org/blog/should-taxi-medallion-owners-be-compensated http://www.cato.org/blog/should-taxi-medallion-owners-be-com...
- netcan 12y agoI agree that this is anti-consumer. But I can imagine similar schemes that aren't. Say a city decides to have a market in the park every Sunday. They issue resellable medallions for stalls, food carts, etc. A few years later, they cancel the market or the medallion system or otherwise make the medallions worthless. With uber there is some ambiguity. Maybe uber aren't cabs. If some awesome new public transport system lowered demand for cabs the city wouldn't be responsible. Claiming that they aren't cabs is how/why uber get around the medallion system in the first place. Taxis and medallion issuers are challenging this in someplace. In any case, I think there is a genuine question here. Even if medallions were wrong in the first place, issuing them was the wrong, not buying one. Buying a medallion is the only way to operate a cab. I don't understand the downvote-anger.
- icebraining 12y agoI don't understand the downvote-anger. I think it's because they're being sloppy in the reading of your post and assuming "therefore Uber should be banned" somehow.
- baddox 12y agoIf Bob and Joe sign a contract, and part of that contract stipulates that I can't start a business, then screw Bob and Joe's contract. They can feel free to fight over which of them owes the other, but I didn't sign any contract, and I'm going to start my business.
- icebraining 12y agoThey can feel free to fight over which of them owes the other But netcan's point is exactly about this fight. You and downvoters seem to be assuming something that's not actually in the post. They can feel free to fight over which of them owes the other But Bob here is your local government! So the fight necessarily involves you and everyone else who lives in the area. That doesn't mean that Uber should be banned, nor did netcan say that.
- baddox 12y ago> But Bob here is your local government! So the fight necessarily involves you and everyone else who lives in the area. Which is why I'm not a fan of contracts between A and B, when one of the terms is that A will take money from me and give it to B.
- ps4fanboy 12y agoI think people think people and companies owning medallions who dont drive cabs but just lease them out are bad. But also there doesnt appear to be a metric that is tied to how many are issued, and has very quickly out paced by population.