[rhino369]

"Taxi lobby" makes it sound like Uber is disrupting some megacorporate industry who control government in smokey back alleys. Taxi corps are small, many are essentially sole proprietorships. The drivers are essentially all running their own business, but the medallion owners tend not to be huge corporations.

Medallions are required because cities regulate taxis prices and policies. Doing so distorts normal market forces. So medallions are a sort of conciliation prize for taxi drivers having the business model dictated. Govenment limits price, but also lowers competition to ensure they can make a profit.

Uber isn't beating some mustached villinous Taxi lobby. They are beating cities who wanted a regulated car service.

I think Uber is probably better than the status quo, but it's not fighting big business, it is big business.

[rayiner]

Uber is nearing $10 billion in bookings, or about 50-100x as much as the largest cab companies. The need of some people to see every tech company is the underdog is ridiculous. By and large the whole point of tech entering these traditional markets is to use capital and technology to achieve scale and efficiency the small businesses playing in those spaces can't hope to match.

[cdcarter]

You need to look at market size to make that statistic anywhere near interesting.

[rayiner]

Uber is 2-3x the size of the whole taxi industry in SF. Remember, it's not like there is a national taxi regulatory system. It's a bunch of separate municipal systems and Uber is far bigger than any of the other players in all of them.

[cdcarter]

Yes, of course, that's what makes the 50x-100x number so inaccurate.

[wutbrodo]

> Taxi corps are small, many are essentially sole proprietorships. The drivers are essentially all running their own business, but the medallion owners tend not to be huge corporations.

Do you have a source for this? I'm only familiar with Chicago numbers, but a medallion costs $360,000[1] and the top 2% of medallion owners own FORTY ONE percent of the total[2]. 3/4 of medallions are owned by corporations who own more than 2 medallions (i.e. $720,000 in up-front investment or more).

[1] http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130913/BLOGS02/1309... [2] https://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/files/2014/06/...

[danieltillett]

In some markets there are medallions that are owned by individual owners and other that can be owned by corporations. Looking at NYC these are both still worth a lot, but they are falling in value thanks to uber and co [1].

1. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/08/upshot/new-york-city-taxi-...

[danieltillett]

I agree. I was more making the point that regulatory arbitrage only works when you attack an industry without enough clout to shut you down, but enough clout to make the market worth attacking. Good luck trying to run regulatory arbitrage around the pharmaceutical industry. There would be massive profits to be made if you did, but you can expect to spend a long time in jail if you tried.

[randomname2]

Some argue big business is big thanks to regulation/government protection keeping competitors out, by preventing them from becoming big or entering the market in the first place.

Isn't it very similar when Uber drivers aren't allowed to compete with the taxi industry, who enjoy a government-sanctioned monopoly?