Their license to operate was worth up to a million; then Uber happened and now it's worth $100k; but many are in debt to $500k or so...
So did the government steal value by failing to enforce the "lack of competition" part of the agreement whereby they issued licenses in the first place?
Or did the government steal value for all the years from then til now by enforcing a licensing and regulation scheme that it now admits wasn't necessary or in the public interest?
Is there any better example of rent-seeking than taxi medallions? If we abolished the concept of medallions overnight, and let anyone who met all of the other requirements be a taxi driver, wouldn't that simultaneously increase the take-home pay of taxi drivers and reduce fares?
It would also reintroduce the problem that medallions were invented to solve: traffic congestion. By restricting the number of taxi drivers on the road via the medallion system, it keeps traffic down and the streets driveable.
... granted, the presence of so many unregulated rideshare cars on the streets renders this moot. We're right back where we started before the medallion system when it comes to congestion.
So did the government steal value by failing to enforce the "lack of competition" part of the agreement whereby they issued licenses in the first place?
Or did the government steal value for all the years from then til now by enforcing a licensing and regulation scheme that it now admits wasn't necessary or in the public interest?
Or was the "value" complete horseshit all along?