alt Hacker News> If the latter, just penalize the listing agents. Trivial.
It's very unlikely to be trivial though because the state typically lacks the resources required to enforce things like this at scale. You'll need to find violators, meet a burden of proof that they violated the law, notify them, give them the right to defend themsleves against the allegation, etc.
They'll almost certainly spend more time and money on the process than is ever collected if this ever happens.
Replies
estearum • last Sunday at 2:18 AM
1. The point of laws is not to turn a profit on their enforcement
2. The burden of proof/right to defense/notifications etc are all quite a lot easier for licensed entities like real estate brokers – that's kind of the entire point of licensure
> They'll almost certainly spend more time and money on the process than is ever collected if this ever happens.
The point of regulation isn't for the state to turn a profit. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that regulations that drive a monetary profit for the state are generally bad because they create a perverse incentive. For example, municipal governments adversely affect traffic flow by lowering speed limits because those lower speed limits generate more ticket revenue.