Well the city wasn't the one that sold them for so much money, it was the aftermarket that drove them up (because essentially no new ones are being issued).

A refund wouldn't do much and in general if you buy an asset that decreases in value you have only yourself to blame. Medallion owners are no more special than anyone else.

I bet if you followed the money you'd find some very wealthy city councilmen or bureaucrats who were in charge of determining how many medallions to issue.

And I bet if a reimbursement program were put into place, most of it would mysteriously not go to the cabbies themselves.

Some cities auction them...

Because it's not right for the banks to lose money on a loan?

If someone invests in a taxi medallion, why are they more worthy of aid than someone who invests in a restaurant?

If someone invests in a restaurant that has a government-granted monopoly and then the government rescinds that monopoly they may have cause for complaint. Or maybe they should have just priced in the risk of a disruptive black swan event.

Betting on a government-granted monopoly is still a bet. Just as if I bought stock in a company that thrives because it has a patent that may or may not be overturned on appeal, or a monopoly that might be smashed due to an anti-trust action.

Investments often result in money lost, that's life - as someone that's been in the market for decades now, yes, I do think it's on you to be aware that black swan bubbles exist, and you'll get wiped out if you're all-in on one when it pops.

If you can't handle the risk of your investment going to zero, hold low-yield bonds, cash, or gold.

I think all investments should have risk, and if the government bails people out then there's all upside and no downside, why wouldn't banks exploit that financially to the extreme?

I think it might be desirable to take out insurance on the asset though as a buyer. It could be an interesting market too.

Banks hardly lose money on loans, they have an infinite capacity to go after delinquents. Try to default on your loan and see what happens to you. You'll be a slave of the bank for the rest of your life.

Of course, individuals bear no such power. So please don't use banks as an example.

> Try to default on your loan and see what happens to you. You'll be a slave of the bank for the rest of your life.

Bankruptcy exists almost entirely to offer protection against this exact scenario playing out.

As long as the debt in question is not a student loan, which usually survive the bankruptcy.

"Usually" is quite correct. You basically have to prove there would be no hope of being able to pay it back without severe financial hardship, and the bar for hardship is fairly high. Even when some student debt is discharged in bankruptcy, it's often a partial discharge.

On the contrary, banks have departments dedicated to estimating the amount they will lose from bad loans. It's expected.

Now we have to pay more taxes to reimburse monopolists who gouged us for decades because they can't gouge us any more?

Pretty sure this will be a Trump executive order soon.

The drivers can work for Uber, and arguably earn as much as they did before. It's the medallion owners who are out of luck.

> The drivers can work for Uber, and arguably earn as much as they did before.

That's not my understanding. I've read that they earn less, and drivers I talk to say it's hard to make money. Also remember that Uber drivers are contractors and get no benefits or other employee protections. Uber does place plenty of stories and op-eds saying otherwise, but I need to see some actual data.

Many cabbies are also independent contractors and thus get none of the benefits Uber and Lyft are assailed for not providing. It's not always the case, but it's not exactly unheard of.

Yes, data would be best. Maybe it's hard to make money as an Uber driver. But driving cab is not such a great job either.

> driving cab is not such a great job either

Many things are 'not ... great', but some of them are much better than others. Homelessness isn't great, neither is a low-wage job and public housing, neither is a decent paying job with an awful boss, neither is being a graduate TA at MIT for an awful professor - but some of those are clearly better than others.

The drivers I've spoken to mostly thought that Uber's entrance into the market had hurt their incomes significantly. Of course, that's hardly a representative sample.