Beautiful license plates should be considered assets and ownership rights must be guaranteed.

The Government has submitted to the National Assembly a draft Resolution on piloting the granting of the right to choose to use car license plates through auction. License plates with four 8s, five 2s, five 5s… and many other numbers that car owners consider beautiful may be auctioned publicly.

The draft has 7 regulations on: Applicable subjects; auction form, rights and obligations of the auction winner; or regulations on transfer, inheritance, as well as post-auction revenue and starting price.

Some opinions say that car license plates are both personal property and a tool for state management, so it is necessary to limit some property rights of auction winners for reasons of state management of security and order. Or some opinions are concerned about speculation and price inflation in the market when auctioning beautiful license plates.

Illustration photo - KT

However, many experts believe that if a beautiful license plate is considered an auctioned asset, the property rights of the winner cannot be restricted, but that asset must be protected in accordance with the provisions of law.

According to economic expert Ngo Tri Long, beautiful license plates used to be a matter of chance and luck for those who registered their license plates, but in fact this chance fell into the pockets of some people. To avoid losing national assets, auctioning beautiful license plates is necessary.

"If the market has demand for nice license plates, we have supply. Once auctioned, nice license plates must be considered assets, and must be guaranteed the rights of ownership, use, purchase, sale, and inheritance," said economic expert Ngo Tri Long.

There are concerns about the market manipulation of beautiful license plates when auctioning like real estate auctions. However, these are two completely different types of goods when land is limited while the number stock is artificial, the number stock is created by humans so it is not limited.

Associate Professor, Dr. Vo Tri Hao analyzed that there is no need to worry about speculation on beautiful car license plates, because speculation on beautiful car license plates is completely different from real estate speculation. Speculation on beautiful license plates pushes up prices and only increases budget revenue. Meanwhile, real estate speculation has an effect on the entire market in the region, at which time the poor have less opportunity to have good and affordable housing.

“Speculating on beautiful license plates does not affect normal license plates (which are still subject to normal fees). If we agree to auction and build a legal framework, we will immediately come up with a definition and criteria to determine beautiful numbers, and set a minimum price,” said Associate Professor, Dr. Vo Tri Hao.

Beautiful car license plates or beautiful phone numbers are luxury goods, these are artificial goods, the higher the auction price, the more beneficial it is for the State budget.

It can be seen that the demand for owning a beautiful license plate is very high in the market. Obviously, the public and transparent auction is an arrow that hits two targets, both ensuring the needs of the people and creating transparency in the revenue source for the State budget.

However, there must be specific mechanisms and regulations to make the auction of beautiful license plates truly transparent, with many participants and strict handling of all acts of auction fraud./.