Posted on 12/29/2016 9:27:31 AM PST by Lorianne
'Montreal has one of the highest restaurant per-capita ratios in North America and the amount of places to eat is worrying local politicians.' ___ lawmakers in Montreal have moved to crack down on new restaurants, in an odious attempt to protect existing ones.
"Montreal has one of the highest restaurant per-capita ratios in North America and the amount of places to eat is worrying local politicians," reads a Canadian Press piece from earlier this week.
If that sounds awful and weird, that's because it is. Studies of the best places to eat often conclude that the more restaurants a city has per-capita, the better its restaurant scene. It's no surprise that the more choices a consumer has, the better off that consumer is.
Montreal does have an impressive number of restaurants. Data shows Montreal trails only New York City in terms of restaurants per capita in North America. As in New York City, that competition is great for Montreal's consumers. But it puts pressure on incumbent restaurateurs. So lawmakers have decided to side with the latter.
The worry expressed by lawmakers has turned into a ban on new restaurants from opening within 25 meters of an existing one along the city's Rue Notre Dame, the street the now-shuttered Sans Menu once called home. Notably, the action comes as "a number of commercial and retail properties remain empty" in this same part of Montreal.
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
Socialists hate competition and free market economies.
Why not just have one restaurant, and let the state own it.
Everything will be Taco Bell.
But they won’t serve tacos.
[eyeroll] What if Montreal-ers actually want to eat out that much? What if one of the new ones that’s being locked out might actually be better than one of the existing ones? What if we let people vote with their Canuck dollars, or Quebecois francs, or whatever the hell Montrealers have in their wallets, and let the cream of the restaurant business rise to the top?
So they are banning new restaurants in Montreal, because they have enough, per the city officials???
I know I’m prone to “capitalist” thinking, but, isn’t this an area where the market will decide how many restaurants are enough??? And that those restaurants who don’t attract enough business will go under??
Do we really want to see government artificially limit the number of any type of business??
What if someone wants to open a new restaurant, perhaps offering a different type of food than existing restaurants have? Wouldn’t we want the market to decide if this new type of food will find enough people to patronize such a restaurant and keep them in business?
This sounds like bad news to me.
But they won’t serve tacos.
"Fill out these forms and you'll get your taco within 6 to 8 weeks."
I, for one, am happy that the government of Montreal is stepping in to protect the city’s residents from the twin perils of good food and economic development.
Every attempt to regulate the market leads to higher cost, worse service, and bad products.
Why even one? Let the Army distribute food, as in Venezuela.
Just give Pretty Boy .10 more years and we’ll need a northern wall too.
This will work exactly like Rent Control...................
Well played, sir.
Hahaha...made me think of “Demolition Man”...:)
You beat me on the eye-roll.
I swear, liberals are using “Atlas Shrugged” as an instructional manual (they being on the side of the looters) instead of a cautionary tale.
The Socialist state dictating their edicts... History has proven time and time again that Socialism doesn’t work. Free enterprise does.
Yeah, we need a directive 10-289 requiring all Montreal-ers to eat at exactly the same restaurants they always have, with exactly the same frequency. Otherwise somebody could go out of business!
So even if you suck you get to stay open!
The Barack Hussein Ebola doctrine of restaurant management. (After all they didn’t build that!)
Fidel’s son learned well from his father’s work in Cuba
U.S. cities usually do the same via liquor licenses.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.