Le taxi : un service public de mobilité hors des grandes villes

It is little known, but most of the taxis in France operate outside the major cities. And the services they supply are very heavily subsidized. In terms of costs to the public purse, the total budget of these subsidies is comparable to the operating subsidies granted to the urban transport networks outside the Paris region, and it is growing rapidly under the combined effect of the aging population, the urban sprawl, the rationalization of hospital services, etc. In France subsidized services provided by Taxis are segmented into several markets depending the public financing agency: town, state, Social Security, etc. In each one of these markets, taxis are more or less in competition with other carriers that fall under different regulatory frameworks according to the ministry that grants the license: Interior, Transportation, Healthcare, Finance. This multiplicity of regulatory frameworks, which distorts competition and inflates costs, is a French specialty.