"official" means run by wizards of the Coast, so essentially the money grab. I suppose it has some benefits in terms of not getting anyone who's swapping cards there overpaying for a reproduction too.

Basically two things are driving after market value. Use in tournaments and collectability. And after market value drives the demand for sealed product(one directly from Hasbro via distributors and then stores).

I really don't understand why no legislation is targeting this market that is exactly like loot boxes.

Where do you think prize support for tournaments would come from if no one had to buy the cards?

Entry fees?

And sponsorships, and vendors and etc.

There's tournaments for _all kinds_ of games that don't require loot-box purchases to compete, it's not exactly an unknown problem.

The Mtg Pro Tour is free of entry and has a $500,000 prize pool. Tournaments encourage people to buy cards.

And all it requires is a gross, exploitative business model and lots of grief.

Is there a legitimate reason for collectors to value an authentic card more than a counterfeit card?

well if you're collecting something, it's age kinda matters?

maybe a counterfeit that's also from the 90s would have a similarly interesting story, but one from last week is much less interesting than the possibility of a beta card from the first set of a game inherently, and so less collectible.

There's no reason not to allow them. You might legitimately prohibit them if unsleeved, but in sleeves there's no difference. Tournaments that aren't run by WotC do allow proxies, though I think Star City Games limits you to 5 proxies, which isn't enough to solve any budget problems. Again, obviously, there's no reason as far as gameplay goes. SCG does traffic in used cards.

The guys who run tourneys are also often guys that participate in the secondary market heavily. Having an 'open to any proxy' tournament would screw their bottom line. The whole point of them running tourneys is to keep excitement in the game and sell more cards on the secondary market.