And Kanterman, 43, would know. A third-generation taxi owner, he himself owns medallions that have been held in his family since immediately after World War II. (When we spoke, he told me a fourth-generation is now in line -- his nephew, a sophomore at Brown University, is working with him this summer.)

Kanterman told me that many medallions have become family businesses, largely because selling them would inflict a heavy tax burden. So there's very little turnover in an already tight market: In the first 5 months of this year, only 133 medallions were exchanged.

Kanterman and his family have filled every role in the taxi business: medallion owners, fleet operators, insurers, buyers, sellers, and investors. Kanterman’s Jericho Taxi Brokers, one of only 2 dozen brokers in the city, sets would-be sellers up with prospective buyers, then arranges financing through banks such as Citigroup (C) or JPMorgan (JPM), or via specialty-financing companies like Medallion Financial Corp. (TAXI).

This matchmaking is easy for Kanterman: His main businesses now, he said, are leasing medallions from owners to operate taxis and offering insurance to drivers. The drivers to whom he leases often dream of buying their own medallions -- if only they could save enough money.

It's the drivers, Kanterman said, who dictate the price of medallions, and not, as one might expect, the passengers. For this reason, he said, a reverse economic effect applies to the taxi business

“The most valuable asset in the taxi industry are the drivers, not the passengers,” he said. “In a bad economy there is an abundance of taxi drivers. Driving a taxicab is the only job you can buy.”

A driver pays a fleet operator $150 a day for the right to drive a taxi. Even in a bad economy, some earnings are better than nothing.

Since the driver population is made up almost entirely of immigrants, “when the economy becomes very strong... people leave to become entrepreneurs,” Kanterman said. But now, there are more drivers than the overall fleet can accommodate.

There are several changes afoot in the taxi fleet. A new pilot program from the city’s Taxi & Limousine Commission to allow ride-sharing recently began. There are more hybrid taxis on the road, which have their own restricted subset of medallions. Last year, however, taxi-fleet owners successfully fought a measure that would require them to use fuel-efficient vehicles.

One thing that won’t change, barring some mass exodus from New York, is the price of a medallion.

“I tell people that we thought they were overpriced at half this price,” Kanterman said matter-of-factly. “But they keep going up.

"Where’s the top? I don’t have an answer.”