IN 2022, TAYLOR SWIFT fans in Massachusetts logged into Ticketmaster desperate to get tickets only to face a total system crash. Most were left devastated by the monopoly’s inability to simply sell tickets to a high-demand show. This year, Massachusetts lawmakers and Attorney General Andrea Campbell have taken important steps to protect consumers. But as the Legislature considers bills intended to protect fans, they must ensure they don’t inadvertently hand Ticketmaster more power and undermine the antitrust lawsuit the state has joined against the ticketing monopoly.
Congress and many states across the country have worked on legislation over the last two years to protect their constituents from the frustrating, rigged live events ticketing system. One important action is the antitrust monopoly lawsuit brought against Ticketmaster by the US Department of Justice and attorneys general from 30 states, including Massachusetts. The suit arises from Ticketmaster’s alleged monopolistic abuses that stifle and control competing ticketing companies, venues, artists, teams, promoters, and virtually all others in the system.
As lawmakers convene in Boston this week to iron out differences between House and Senate versions of the state’s economic development bill – which includes provisions regulating the ticketing marketplace – it’s critical for fans that they get it right.
House Majority Leader Mike Moran of Boston and Rep. Tackey Chan of Quincy originally introduced a bill to protect a consumer’s right to freely transfer a purchased ticket independent of the original system – in most cases that’s Ticketmaster. It would allow concert and sports fans to give away or resell their tickets to a concert or Red Sox, Bruins, Celtics, or Patriots game they could no longer attend.
Transferability isn’t just about convenience. It also ensures fans can comparison shop from marketplaces where current ticketholders sell their tickets at prices both higher and lower than originally paid by transferring them to another fan. A Sports Fans Coalition report found sports fans saved $260 million between 2017 and 2023 by purchasing their tickets on the secondary market . Over the same period, fans in Massachusetts saved more than $17 million. And fans in states which protect the right to transfer a ticket by law saved almost twice as much as those in states that do not.
Similarly, according to a recent report by The American Consumer Institute, which analyzed ticket sales to roughly 80,000 events, 55 percent of events featured tickets on the secondary resale market sold below face value. Moreover, polling finds that Americans value their right to freely transfer their tickets and support laws that protect this right.
While the bill introduced by Moran and Chan would greatly benefit consumers, in the course of the legislative session, things changed. The House passed its much larger economic development bill and included an amended version of the original legislation. This amended version could do more harm than good.
Some new provisions could undermine the DOJ’s efforts to fight Ticketmaster’s monopoly. A new section also permits a venue operator or ticketing company to impose requirements on which ticketing platforms can be used to sell or transfer a ticket – which would allow Ticketmaster to require fans to buy or resell tickets exclusively on its platform, where it sets the terms and fees. This starves ability of consumers to shop around or resell tickets and ultimately pads the pockets of already rich corporations.
The amended legislation also redefines what a ticket represents. Most fans consider a ticket their personal property, meaning they get to decide how to use it. This bill redefines tickets to be a revokable license, meaning Ticketmaster or the venue can deny entry or cancel tickets purchased from a competing ticket seller like SeatGeek, StubHub, or Vivid Seats.
There is no other market where one company can invalidate something already sold that is later resold by a competitor. Once purchased by a fan, a ticket is merely evidence of permission to enter an event and should not be codified as a license tethered to the original seller that can be used to abuse fans and competitors. This kind of draconian legislative text is intended to embolden monopolies.
The House legislation also requires refunds for canceled events, but strangely only from secondary market resellers, effectively letting Ticketmaster off the hook for refunds to canceled shows. Finally, it would require secondary resale sites to include the total price before checkout, but would continue to allow Ticketmaster to deceive fans by showing the base ticket price only at first, later to add more fees at checkout. These amendments make no sense other than to provide handouts to Ticketmaster to cheat consumers.
The ticketing market is confusing, consolidated, and too expensive. Although most lawmakers are committed to protecting their constituents, they must be deliberate about supporting real reforms that will actually help fans – not monopolies. The conference committee on the economic development bill should revive Chan’s original proposal and leave out all the junk tacked on to what has unfortunately become a special interest bill favoring Ticketmaster.
Brian Hess is the executive director of the non-profit Sports Fans Coalition, which was founded in 2009 and advocates wherever public policy impacts the games we love.
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