Hacker News Reader

Actually, this article raises a point I'd not considered: Why doesn't Uber just start buying medallions, especially in large / angry markets? In NYC, medallions are down to $600,000: http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2015-taxi-medallion-king. Presumably Uber wouldn't have to buy all the medallions out there, but if it bought enough it could circumvent much of the political opposition from current holders.

View on HN

Because buying them would push up the price, especially once the sellers realized the motive. If they could really buy them all for $600,000 / each they probably would.

Nevertheless, having the government compulsorily aquire and compensate previous owners in an orderly fashion, where they all get the same compensation instead of being able to push up the price by holding out is a wonderful solution to this kind of problem.

It would be great to see this happen more in the US, taxi medallions and rent regulation are obvious areas where just compensating the current beneficiaries as a one-off, then opening up the market would do everyone a world of good.

Buying worthless taxicab medallions to circumvent political opposition seems like a fool's errand. 13,605 NYC taxicab medallions at a cost of $600,00 is $8.1 Billion, for an asset that's destined to be worth zero in a few years.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com