NYC Cabbies Say ‘No-Cost’ Bailout Would Avoid Financial Ruin
- The city would buy distressed debt from lenders at discounts
- Mayor de Blasio insists federal government must pay billions
Taxis line up at John F. Kennedy (JFK) Airport while waiting their turn to pick up passengers in 2018.
Photographer: Spencer Platt/Getty ImagesBill de Blasio campaigned for New York mayor -- and for president -- vowing to help low-income workers and the least fortunate. But financially desperate taxi drivers, devastated by competition from Uber Technologies Inc. and similar companies, say he has abandoned them.
The 22,000-member Taxi Workers Alliance says it has a plan at almost no net expense to the city: bailing out thousands of struggling drivers who can’t afford to repay expensive loans they took out from private lenders to buy city taxi-operating medallions. De Blasio counters that it would cost billions of dollars to solve the problem and says the federal government should pay.