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Comment by harryh | Hacker News Reader

I dunno why you're getting downvoted. Regulatory capture is a common and well understood phenomenon.

"Regulatory capture is a common..." True!

"...and well understood phenomenon." Oh, if only it were so.

Good comeback. People in general understanding that and fighting it would be really helpful. Instead, they too often fall for the published excuse for laws or regs that only existed for money or votes in key districts.

Or, heck, they don't think about the published excuse at all. That's the real knotty problem - most people don't really have the time or information or inclination to care, so regulatory capture just keeps ratcheting up because each new step "seems reasonable".

That's a good point. I definitely overstated. Thanks for the correction.

Well, I was kind of joking. People who call it "regulatory capture" of course understand the concept. To most people it's counterintuitive and barely grasped.

It's what Uber and IIRC AirBnb ran into constantly. For Uber, it was usually to protect the interests of existing players local politicians supported.

To be fair, Uber is a much better example, Airbnb not so much. Uber is shitty in the way it treats drivers, but the majority don't seem to have an issue with the platform (doesn't excuse their behavior). The housing laws Airbnb is constantly battling with are to protect residents from inflated housing costs, and if Airbnb gets its way it is going to do actual damage compared to the "think of the taxi drivers" silliness that Uber runs into.

"Uber is a much better example, Airbnb not so much. Uber is shitty in the way it treats drivers, but the majority don't seem to have an issue with the platform (doesn't excuse their behavior). "

I'll take that one. Especially "think of the taxi drivers silliness." It's the kind of stuff I'm talking about that's politically motivated.

Uhh, that's generally not the purpose of housing laws. Residents generally benefit from higher housing prices, since they usually own houses. From what I understand, it's a mix of giving political power to local homeowners, protecting housing prices, and opposing things that make the area less desirable to live in. NIMBY bullshit, basically.

I mean, sure, it's marketed as being a measure to control housing prices, but so is rent control.

Property owners benefit from higher housing prices, in dense urban areas these are not typically the same people that occupy the dwelling. Renting out apartments on Airbnb removes that unit from the local housing stock, raising prices as demand increases and supply drops. This is why San Francisco is battling with Airbnb, housing is already expensive enough, having people sub-let apartments or buy houses only to put them up on Airbnb is making an already bad housing shortage even worse.

No. Uber ran into the problem that they were a taxi company, but they didn't want to abide by the taxi company regulations.

Regulations such as creating a high, financial, barrier to entry that benefited incumbent, taxi companies more than consumers. Regulations paid for by lobbyists for incumbent, taxi companies. Corruption 101.

No.

Yes. Unless you think the taxi companies were giving millions to local politicians protecting them just coincidentally and out of some greater good. Example of that plus the competition responding similarly:

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-taxi-uber-lobby-sto...

No. I have not, nor will I ever buy into the propaganda that Uber was out to do anything to regulations. They were out to make money, and they decided they didn't have to follow the law. That's it.

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