Doesn't discrimination end up hurting the hosts in the end? Having less demand drives the rental costs down.
Someone should do a study on this, A/B testing racism!
Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
51–60 of 403 posts
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#52I don't know if this is really a tractable problem. At the end of the day, either airbnb lets hosts decide who stays or doesn't. If they don't let hosts decide, they'll likely lose a ton of hosts, since having someone stay in your home is a very personal thing and a huge risk. If they do, then they're going to have significant discrimination problems as long as people are discriminatory, i.e., basically forever.
That was my thought here as well. It's one thing to have very public businesses with anti-discrimination rules, but something like Air BnB where people have to decide in most cases who they are going to let into their homes is a much more complicated problem. We're seeing a wide trend in the US where people want rules to prevent people from making choices that they don't agree with, which was basically the opposite o…
Being a white supremacist is not a protected class in the US and it's illegal to discriminate on the basis of race in housing.
The law seems perfectly clear to me.
As made applicable by section 803 of this title and except as exempted by sections 803(b) and 807 of this title, it shall be unlawful-- (a) To refuse to sell or rent after the making of a bona fide offer, or to refuse to negotiate for the sale or rental of, or otherwise make unavailable or deny, a dwelling to any person because of race, color, religion, sex, familial status, or national origin.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#53I don't know if this is really a tractable problem. At the end of the day, either airbnb lets hosts decide who stays or doesn't. If they don't let hosts decide, they'll likely lose a ton of hosts, since having someone stay in your home is a very personal thing and a huge risk. If they do, then they're going to have significant discrimination problems as long as people are discriminatory, i.e., basically forever.
Airbnb's model is to provide very limited oversight. If they have to support these types of grievances to any sort of regulatory standard, it's going to kill their business model because it means they will need to increase overhead with compliance systems. Humans are still way smarter than any AI automated system, so even the dumbest humans will be able to outsmart them unless they have people handling the complaints.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
That was my thought here as well. It's one thing to have very public businesses with anti-discrimination rules, but something like Air BnB where people have to decide in most cases who they are going to let into their homes is a much more complicated problem. We're seeing a wide trend in the US where people want rules to prevent people from making choices that they don't agree with, which was basically the opposite o…
Being a white supremacist is not a protected class in the US and it's illegal to discriminate on the basis of race in housing. The law seems perfectly clear to me. As made applicable by section 803 of this title and except as exempted by sections 803(b) and 807 of this title, it shall be unlawful-- (a) To refuse to sell or rent after the making of a bona fide offer, or to refuse to negotiate for the sale or rental of…
I think Airbnb would argue that it's not their place to enforce these laws; and that if individual hosts are violating them, the government should go after them.
It's a typical problem of the "sharing" economy. I'm not sure the courts will agree with them, but their strategy has been similar to Uber's in that they come in, break the law (or at the very least operate in a legal grey area), then get so big that traditional regulatory systems have no way to deal with them.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#55well people should have figured out by now : Airbnb's aren't hotels. And people should be free to deny others staying at their place, for whatever reason. Airbnb can't have it both ways, they know it and this effort will be pure PR.
Nudging works. Some people are full-on racists, but for many even adding a small hurdle (like having to manually cancel and find an excuse for an instant-booked reservation) is enough to dissuade them without taking away the final say.
They do need to up their game when it comes to pre-validating guests, though, since any bad experience will only act as confirmation for the pre-existing bias.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
What if there was a reputation threshold for a traveller to make an instant booking? Of course it's still not immune to racism or sexism, but it seems that it would provide a decent buffer against it.
Nope. I would not ever rent a room with instant booking unless Airbnb signs a blank check for any damages by the guest (which it of course won't)
They have insurance either way. I've had nothing but good experiences but to each their own.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#57well people should have figured out by now : Airbnb's aren't hotels. And people should be free to deny others staying at their place, for whatever reason. Airbnb can't have it both ways, they know it and this effort will be pure PR.
I dunno; I feel Airbnb is really losing control of their product. Most recently, I've noticed a lot of listings of great places for awesome prices... but only if you're willing to rent for 12 months continuously, provide your own furniture and pay a security deposit -- which is just a fucking apartment lease. It makes it hard to find "legit" rentals with so much of this kind of spam filling up the listings. Worse yet…
Funny, the "report listing" is easy to find on the site, but it seems to be missing on the app. I wonder if it's a deliberate choice or a bug.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Being a white supremacist is not a protected class in the US and it's illegal to discriminate on the basis of race in housing. The law seems perfectly clear to me. As made applicable by section 803 of this title and except as exempted by sections 803(b) and 807 of this title, it shall be unlawful-- (a) To refuse to sell or rent after the making of a bona fide offer, or to refuse to negotiate for the sale or rental of…
I think Airbnb would argue that it's not their place to enforce these laws; and that if individual hosts are violating them, the government should go after them. It's a typical problem of the "sharing" economy. I'm not sure the courts will agree with them, but their strategy has been similar to Uber's in that they come in, break the law (or at the very least operate in a legal grey area), then get so big that traditi…
I could agree with this.
But, since the government will have to do all this inspection, I guess you agree that they will have to levy a tax on AirBnB to pay for it?
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
That was my thought here as well. It's one thing to have very public businesses with anti-discrimination rules, but something like Air BnB where people have to decide in most cases who they are going to let into their homes is a much more complicated problem. We're seeing a wide trend in the US where people want rules to prevent people from making choices that they don't agree with, which was basically the opposite o…
Being a white supremacist is not a protected class in the US and it's illegal to discriminate on the basis of race in housing. The law seems perfectly clear to me. As made applicable by section 803 of this title and except as exempted by sections 803(b) and 807 of this title, it shall be unlawful-- (a) To refuse to sell or rent after the making of a bona fide offer, or to refuse to negotiate for the sale or rental of…
The law, if you read it, pretty clearly does NOT apply to AirBnB (except possibly people who rent a large number of flats on it). From 803(b):
(b)Nothing in section 804 of this title (other than subsection (c)) shall apply to--(1) any single-family house sold or rented by an owner:...
(It's a long section, I've snipped most of it. Section 804 is what you quoted.)
(2)rooms or units in dwellings containing living quarters occupied or intended to be occupied by no more than four families living independently of each other, if the owner actually maintains and occupies one of such living quarters as his residence.
So if I'm renting out my home on AirBnB, or even a full floor of a 4 family brownstone, none of this actually applies to me.
Re: Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by Its Hosts
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not really relevant here. The article is specifically about racial discrimination.
What's relevant is that AirBnB is against the Freedom of Owners to select who stays at their place. In the end Owners should have the final word, no matter what, certainly not AirBnB.
Do you think employers should be free to select who works in their company, irrespective of any laws surrounding discrimination?