Comments on: Will the recession liberalize wine laws? What to watch

By: Is Pennsylvania finally taking aim at the PLCB? | Dr Vino's wine blog

Is Pennsylvania finally taking aim at the PLCB? | Dr Vino's wine blog — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 20:50:18 +0000

[...] we discussed last year, privatization can be botched. Indeed, Iowa and West Virginia got less than the early estimates in their privatizations. From a [...]

By: Gary

Gary — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 15:32:58 +0000

It is a mixed bag. There is no doubt that the private companies will lock up the politicians to give them everything they want to increase profits. For example, no inbound or outbound shipping.

Illinois is a joke, we had reasonable policies to allow importing of wine that I was more than happy to pay taxes on to get things I couldn’t find in my state.

What happens- my wine purchasing has decreased.

By: Alex A.

Alex A. — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 01:42:28 +0000

Dr. Vino, your blog is very interesting and I couldn’t agree more. Monopoly and the enforcement of laws that violate the Dormant Commerce Clause within the US Constitution need to be addressed for the common good of the people and the state/federal governments. While limiting retailer’s rights to ship wines across state lines cheat state’s ability to obtain licensing revenues, and collect state taxes. The federal government would ses alcohol consumption increase,and thus would generate millions of dollars in Federal Excise Taxes. Lastly, hard working, tax paying citizens that want to be able to buy wines outside of their local reach could purchase a bottle using a required adult 21 signature policy. Pay-to-play politics at its finest…

By: chicagowanderer

chicagowanderer — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 19:36:45 +0000

The city of Chicago did sell the rights to the revenue arising from the parking meters, but the city also agreed to the rise in rates before the sale. This is why Morgan Stanley paid 60 times trailing revenue. This price is very high when one considers that the S&P 500 trades at less than 20 times profits, which are revenue less expenses. The truth is that raising the rates was necessary for public revenue but making it appear as though someone else (Morgan Stanley) did it should have made the move less politically damaging to the politicians (not to say the plan worked).

By: Ben Simons

Ben Simons — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 17:34:07 +0000

Really interesting post. I was reading something similar yesterday that focused on Washington state’s liquor sale monopoly. I’d love to see some of this crazy alcohol laws changed. Hope it really does take place, but I am not getting my hopes up too much.

By: Per-BKWine

Per-BKWine — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 16:47:15 +0000

One can always hope.

Certainly, replacing one monopoly with another will not give consumers any benefits.

It might be interesting to know that the fact that there are several US states that retain a monopoly for alcohol distribution and/or retail is taken as proof of that the monopoly system is the best way to sell alcohol by some monopoly supporters in Sweden – in particular by the monopolist retailer itself.

For example, that argument featured prominently in big double spread advertisements in a national campaign that Systembolaget, the Swedish monopoly that is a retail-only monopoly, recently did. “Look: many states in the US also have monopolies for alcohol. You see, it really is best for consumer to have an alcohol monopoly”.

By the way, that campaign humbly stated in it’s headline “We’ve invented the best way to sell alcohol” over two pages in, if I remember right, 59 newspapers across the country.