Taxi drivers want more competitors, not fewer, to sustain demand.
Evidence
- Cooperation among drivers is based not only on the fact that everyone contributes to costs. If taxis are too few, the average waiting time for customers increases; if, in addition, the meter starts running when the call is taken, the average fare is also higher, possibly so high that the customers will no longer choose to call a taxi. Thus, the taxi market, even though it consists of self-employed drivers competing with one another for customers, is a case of everyone wanting more rather than fewer competitors, up to a point, lest the market simply cease to exist. — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 1016
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to the reader’s framings: the mechanism of a self-regulating cooperative market parallels Milgrom’s Champagne Fairs entry-control logic and Gambetta’s protection cartels limiting entry to sustain credibility.
- SHARE: A neat economic-inversion fact for the reader interested in how cooperative cartels can benefit from more members despite competition.