Busy lives make for poor blogging. I keep seeing things I want to write about, but keep not being able to find the time to do it properly. So this conglomeration will have to do. Here goes…
- Did you see Jeff Jacoby’s column a few days ago on campaign finance? Of course the suggestion that Massachusetts change its laws to allow campaign contributions directly from corporations to candidates is ridiculous. But he is correct about one thing: the peculiar loophole in our campaign finance laws that permits labor unions, but no other artificial entity, to contribute $15,000 to a campaign, should be eliminated. That’s just a staggering sum of money that, especially in relatively low-level races like state rep, could be outcome-determinative. It makes no sense, and it should stop.
- The Globe’s Dante Ramos hopped on board the “ditch the taxi medallions” bandwagon. I’ve been saying for years that the medallion system is bad for drivers and bad for riders, and should be eliminated. Ramos is correct that Uber isn’t taxi drivers’ biggest problem; the medallion system is.
- I’m starting to wonder whether someone from No Boston Olympics managed to infiltrate the PR team working on behalf of Boston 2024. Because Boston 2024 is close to losing the Globe’s Shirley Leung, and if they manage that, they can probably kiss the whole thing goodbye. Her last column: “The public — and now public officials — are tired of Boston 2024 acting like a private club, being exclusive and secretive about everything from venue details to staff salaries…. [I]t feels like Boston 2024 has become a shadow government, working the system to put on a multibillion-dollar event that could transform the city and the region for decades to come…. If patronage was an Olympic sport, Boston 2024 would get the gold.” Oof.
- Yvonne Abraham is exactly right: if anything is to change at the MBTA, T riders have to stay as angry as they were when the system was literally shutting down around them. As the snow melts, and as Keolis slowly (very slowly) gets the commuter rail back to normal, it will be oh so tempting to think of February 2015 as a bad dream from which we are finally waking up. And if that happens, look for Bob “T structure and whatnot” DeLeo and Ron “a little crazy to be spending money” Mariano to fall back on the strategy that has served their narrow interests well but the commuting public’s interests exceptionally poorly: obfuscate, delay, and insist on “reform before revenue” with the unspoken rule that no reform is ever good enough. There is more momentum now than there’s been in years to fix the T. Don’t waste it.
- Elizabeth Warren is not a natural comedian. That’s OK with me – I didn’t vote for her based on her comic timing. But for all that, she did pretty well at this year’s St. Patrick’s Day breakfast. The line about Scott Brown was especially good.
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That should frighten you, David.
I do not so much support CU so much as I want a level playing field (which I think CU created). Human-only campaign donations can preserve the republic.
If the medallion system is scrapped, will it be a public ‘taking’? Some have invested north of a half-million dollars and if the rules are radically changed they need relief for the consequences of following the rules (and the solution is NOT to stick it to Uber drivers).
Warren needs new material if all she can think of is to make fun of Scott. She won – get over it.
There were only two Scott Brown jokes out of about 15 total. And they were funny, especially the first one.
Re takings, certainly, that is the argument that the medallion owners have already raised. But I think it’s weak. A medallion is essentially a license to operate a taxi. And the state’s authority over licenses is pretty sweeping, as we recently learned in the casino case.
..is that it does’t have NECN. So no, I could not watch live. And in reports, including yours, it seemed she said nothing else.
And not sure about medallions. If they do get away with it they are bankrupting working class entrepreneurs.
Medallion owners are “working class entrepreneurs?”
Or does “working class entrepreneurs” mean entrepreneurs who hire working class people so they don’t have to work at all?
The Medallion system is as close as one can get to a hereditary feudal system in Boston — even more so than liquor licenses.
If a city wants to eliminate the negative effects of an existing medallion system, it need not eliminate medallions. It could simply issue more. Surely we agree that cities have the right to issue additional medallions, right? It’s been done in cities all over America.
There are what, 1825 medallions in Boston? No problem. Boston could simply issue another 50 each and every month going forward to the highest bidder. Why not another 1000 all at once? Well, you’ve got to ramp up your regulatory staff, deal with buckets of new drivers, etc. Of course, when folks understand that you’re going to auction 50 every month ongoing, they’re not going to pay six figures. They might not even pay five. So it goes. If the goal is to eliminate the monopoly-related problems of the medallion system, it’s not going to go hand-in-hand with substantial new revenue from medallion income.
Someone needs to explain this to me from the beginning. Why can’t anyone start a taxi business provided they conform with appropriate regulations? Why does there seem to be a rationing or limitation on the number of taxis that can operate? If anything a medallion should be the city’s seal of approval, but they should not be rationed or sold – rather awarded to any company that meets the requirements.
I really don’t understand this notion that the city should artificially limit the number of cabs on the road. Econ 101 dictates that doing so inflates prices and pretty much guarantees inadequate supply – and, indeed, that’s what we have in Boston. Just lay down reasonable licensure requirements, and let the market handle the rest. It will quickly become apparent how many cabs can operate profitably in Boston.
but nobody seems to have a good argument that the current number is the correct number. In fact, there seems to be broad agreement that it’s too low.
Nevertheless, we have medallions in a number of cities. My claim is that a city doesn’t have to risk a “taking” claim by eliminating medallions — just issue more. If the market believes that many more medallions are coming, it won’t pay more than a small fee for each one. End result: more taxis on the road, much lower investment requirement for new entrants, and existing medallions devalued substantially.
is already in freefall, presumably because of Uber and similar services. Per the Ramos op-ed linked in my post, their value has declined 50% in just a year, from $700,000 to $350,000. If the city wants to call a license to operate a taxi a “medallion,” that’s OK with me. I just don’t understand the logic behind issuing only a set number of them, especially when (as you say) pretty much everyone who doesn’t already own one seems to agree that the current number is way too low.