This should be easily solved if the system were working correctly. That is independent contractors were able to make bid on ride request. Undesirable destination? Customer just has to offer price someone is willing to offer a service at. At some price point someone is willing to do the job.
The whole point of granting taxi medallions in the first place was to provide a semi-monopoly on the service, in return for requiring taxi drivers to act like a public utility. There’s a societal benefit to being able to get a ride from wherever, to wherever for a pre-determined fare, without having to worry that your destination is a “bad neighborhood” or your skin is the wrong color or your guide dog might not be allowed.
We should not let ride sharing services just gut this aspect of hired car service.
So we should ban them from operating without medals? You can't have it both ways... And I don't understand why shouldn't free market apply to them as well. Or maybe start applying it to all labour. Demand that all workers can be hired at certain price level for any job...
You CAN have it both ways. We can still hold the business to requirements that we set, that represent a baseline of public acceptability, with or without medallions.
"The free market" isn't an answer to everything. We decide as a society that some forms of market pricing are not allowed. For instance, I can not pay children to work for me. I can not pay a woman less than a man. I can not pay an old person less than a younger one. I can not refuse service to someone who has a disability. These are social choices that we make, and I would argue that we SHOULD make, to restrict the free market in ways that benefit society as a whole.
