Tuesday, May 27, 2014

It's A Stupid Law


He’s breaking the law.

But it’s a stupid law. 

But there are lots of stupid laws!  Any time I hear about “taxi medallions” I think, “stupid law”.  Limiting access to services, unnecessarily driving up prices for consumers.

What's the appropriate response?

1 comment:

allen (in Michigan) said...

Pretty much there isn't one. The asymmetry of interest ensures that, except during unusual times in the political arena, those with a great deal of interest in some bit of policy will outweigh those with only a passing interest in that same area.

With regard to taxis, for instance, Uber - www.uber.com - may create that unusual time due to a change in the technology. The taxi companies have struck back trying to hold onto their monopoly but the new technology may have created a whole, new constituency with much higher interest then the public at large. That might offset the high degree of interest the taxi companies have in maintaining their monopoly and this particular bit of stupid public policy might fall.

Other times the change is more purely political such that which is going on in the field of public education. Enough people have gotten angry enough that when a new idea showed up - charters - there was sufficient offsetting interest to neutralize the power of the public education lobby.