[0] https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1337634/000119312525...
[1] https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forum/private-equity/andro-c...
This should be much higher. A class action lawsuit shouldn’t be worth less than what these people can make scalping a single Taylor Swift concert.
This just opens an opportunity for them to settle, admit no wrongdoing and then include a clause in the settlement that prevents further lawsuits.
>WHEREFORE, Plaintiff, individually and on behalf of the Class, respectfully requests that this Court:
>...
>Award compensatory, statutory, and/or restitutionary damages, as applicable, in an amount to be determined at trial and that the aggregate amount in controversy across the whole class exceeds $5,000,000;
it doesn't say that the damages are capped at 5M, only that they're asking for at least 5M.
Make reselling tickets illegal again overall.
Allow resale within 5 days of the show only (for those that genuinely can't make it), and for face value+original fees only.
Airports seem to handle them just fine?
That's the security check, of which id check is only one part. The bottleneck is everyone needing to take out their laptops and then repack their bags. Same with boarding. The bottleneck there is people putting their luggage into the overhead compartments.
Edit guess that doesn’t work for kids. Start the tickets at 10k and drop them by a percentage a day. Automatic price discovery. Rich people can just buy them whenever they want.
1 - I’m more likely to buy a ticket or pay a higher price if there’s a chance of turning a profit if I can’t go.
2 - Speculators are more likely to buy unused inventory if they can turn a profit. This increases total tickets sold. (Scalpers get paid for taking risk)
I’m not defending this. I’ve given up on concerts for my favorite larger bands due to sticker shock.
But consider Ms. Swift. All of her shows sell out, period. Face value tickets are maybe $400 max, and resell for $2000+. I don’t think she sees any benefit from scalpers. Ditto any performer that is in very high demand and certain to sell out and have unmet demand.
If a ticket sells for $2k then the platform gets some massive portion of that (like $400?) - are you sure some of that doesn't make its way back to the artist, at least on the primary sale platform? I would be rather surprised if it didn't.
Illegal usually means there's a law forbidding it.
Tickets are usually governed by the Terms and Conditions (Contract) between original purchase.
It's already possible for the terms to forbid resale.
So as it stands it's possible to sell untransferable tickets. And those who sell such tickets are in breach of contract, but are not breaking a law.
What would 'making reselling tickets illegal' entail, a law that makes selling transferable tickets illegal? That would be a very weak position. A law that upgrades the resale of untransferable tickets to a crime? Again a very weak position.
I contend that people that suggest and write laws should learn about actual law.
People seem to be willing to pay crazy prices for events.
If you bought all of the food then offered the food at 10x the prices, we'd be outraged with you, yes.
Stakes are lower because it's a luxury good, not food, but it's the same idea.
If you bought up all the food, farmers would raise prices until either you couldn't afford to do that anymore or eventually there is a splurge of new farmers taking advantage of all your free money until you run out of money. It could maybe work in times of famine where the government introduces price controls or rationing; it does not work in normal times.
For black markets (which is essentially what scalping is) to work, there has to be some shortage of a good that is priced artificially low. It works with concerts because singers can only sing so much but they also don't want to make the concert so unaffordable that only millionaires can go. There are very few situations like that. In most industries you would just increase prices until supply equals demand.
I should note that outrage doesn't seem to land on the people who buy from scalpers, which is...probably correct? Seems easier to say "don't break the contract" to scalpers instead of fans who are just able to pay more.
This is the reason that businesses don't try to monopolize the food industry. It's not competition as we just saw from the egg industry. The government gets pushed back from the masses pretty quickly on food related issues.
But you provided your own counterexample with eggs?
Without reselling scalpers have no reason to scoop up the tickets.
So if you prevent reselling... then concertgoers just have to do a lottery or something for the scarce resource and people who aren't interested in the concert have no reason to buy the tickets! Just a better experience for everyone except for the scalpers and I guess Taylor Swift cuz she won't know the price ceiling for tickets.
An auction would be the obvious solution, and I guess you could argue it effectively is an auction, just with initial sales that pretend to be a race and are actually sold to speculators who then run the auction.
Yes, this is “normal” in the sense that it is common. It is “normal” in the same way that cancer is “normal”.
No, this is not “normal” in the sense of being behavior the government should just tolerate. It is in the same category of market failures as monopolies and externalities.
That said...if you can do that, you'll probably find that some additions of economic value are far more defensible than others, so it shouldn't all be flattened in the manner you're suggesting.
I mean, scalpers add economic value, right?! They allow (wealthier) people who didn't stand in line at the right time to have a chance to purchase a ticket!
Subscriptions are rent-seeking. Loans are rent-seeking. Spending millions in capital to buy a building and renting apartments for thousands? Rent-seeking. Copyright and patents, for sure, unless an AI company is involved in which case copyright is noble and must last a thousand years, because AI companies are rent-seeking.
I'm sure if they get shut down, they'll just do it again under a different name, but they can't pretend it's a small handful of scalpers when they're the ones doing it themselves.
Because there is value for the artist in maintaining the perception of accessibility.