51–60 of 179 posts
Economic efficiency through sharing is a great thing for society, it is just that it is hard to get it right at scale but nevertheless we are trying and we will test success sooner or later in some areas.
Indeed it is. I've posted and talked about this along with posting Richard D Wolff's video "Uber is an old scam" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGwZcR0q6VE&t=10s We've seen this before, at the beginning of a new industry. And once capitalism sets in, everyone is dragged down to a race to the bottom... Along with safety and human treatment. And then once the abuses are rampant, people demand change in the way of regu…
> Until prices then rise Which they didn't do entirely through the invisible hand. In many areas, taxi regulation was also used limit competition (e.g. medallion systems, unnecessarily difficult licensing exams). In addition to higher prices it permitted lower quality service. If you want to prevent destructive wildfires, you need to do forest management to reduce the fuel that builds up. The taxi industry was a fore…
Wrong. If you want to prevent destructive wildfires, you have to let the forest burn regularly, preferably in a controlled manner. If you just do forest management to reduce the amount of fuel that builds up, all you accomplish is setting up the stage for a massive, all consuming fire that, once started, burns up everything. Example: California.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/02/nyregion/taxi-drivers-sui... It's easy to be cavalier if you ignore the effect on Taxi workers. Ride sharing replaced a stable, unionized, middle class career with low-paying, low-benefit gig jobs. It ruined people's lives and destroyed a stable field of work. This wasn't a technological innovation -- it was a legal one, where they figured out a way to evade regulations to undercut…
It ruined people's lives and destroyed a stable field of work. Telephone operators and travel agents used to have stable careers. This wasn't a technological innovation If the technology is so insignificant, why didn't taxi companies develop ride-hailing apps? Either it's actually complex, or they decided they had no need to improve service because of their oligopoly.
Telephone operators and travel agents used to have stable careers.
If you do not like the sharing economy, then do not participate in it. "Other people should not be doing this, and should not be doing that, ..." is one bridge too far. For heaven's sake, who the hell are you, to tell other people what to do?
Wait til you hear about criminal law!
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Here's the thing. Economic transactions can have externalities -- costs to someone not a party to the transaction that are not reflected in the cost of the good or service in the transaction. The "sharing economy" has loads of externalities. It's like saying, if you don't like the bonfire, don't participate to it, when you've set the fire downwind of someone and there's smoke blowing in their tent.
Yeah, it is always possible to discover new externalities, if you want to. If you sleep with that girl, I cannot do that at the same time. So, that is also an externality. Since it affects what I can do, I have the right to stick my nose into that business, no?
An externality is something like "cigarettes produce smoke that contains a lot of carcinogens, and therefore cigarette smoking can contribute to the poor health of people who are nearby even if they do not choose to smoke themselves."
If you do not like the sharing economy, then do not participate in it. "Other people should not be doing this, and should not be doing that, ..." is one bridge too far. For heaven's sake, who the hell are you, to tell other people what to do?
When someone decides to turn their apartment until a hotel room, it affects all of their neighbours. They can't then decide not to participate in the sharing economy, it is thrust upon them unwillingly.
Articles like this ignore the impact on individuals. For every group that is trying to full time Uber/Lyft or turn an AirBNB into a hotel, there's also tons of people who are doing in the spare time to make some extra or work the better allocation of resources into something beneficial for them. See threads like: https://twitter.com/RantyAmyCurtis/status/110272136190510694... That's what sharing is about, more optima…
Allowing people to participate in activities is useful, but that assumes that they are well-informed and rational. People also willingly participate in multi-level marketing; that doesn’t mean it’s good for them and society to do so.
Sharing economy has existed well before technology and will outlast Uber and others. When you ask friends to drop you at airport that is sharing. When your aunt babyseats for you that is sharing economy. Potluck is sharing economy. Economic efficiency through sharing is a great thing for society, it is just that it is hard to get it right at scale but nevertheless we are trying and we will test success sooner or late…
We have a Danish app for taking people with you when you travel between towns. This is an aspect where public transportation unfortunately sucks after decades of conservatives in government, but it’s also an area where there is no taxa service or Uber styles thing because it’s too expensive.
But sharing the gas price with strangers when you’re going anyway absolutely works.
There is a platform for it, but their primary source of income comes from their leasing services. I’d say that is an example of the sharing economy, because it’s actually people sharing and not just some no-workers-rights shithole.
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Yeah, it is always possible to discover new externalities, if you want to. If you sleep with that girl, I cannot do that at the same time. So, that is also an externality. Since it affects what I can do, I have the right to stick my nose into that business, no?
That's not an externality. And honestly, your chosen example is rather unpleasant. An externality is something like "cigarettes produce smoke that contains a lot of carcinogens, and therefore cigarette smoking can contribute to the poor health of people who are nearby even if they do not choose to smoke themselves."
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here's the thing. Economic transactions can have externalities -- costs to someone not a party to the transaction that are not reflected in the cost of the good or service in the transaction. The "sharing economy" has loads of externalities. It's like saying, if you don't like the bonfire, don't participate to it, when you've set the fire downwind of someone and there's smoke blowing in their tent.
Yeah, it is always possible to discover new externalities, if you want to. If you sleep with that girl, I cannot do that at the same time. So, that is also an externality. Since it affects what I can do, I have the right to stick my nose into that business, no?
Do you really think that everyone should simply bend to the externalities that you generate?
You really think that you could drop toxic waste on a river that goes through your property and no one can complain when the river dies because you are more important that the victims of your externalities?
Because it is a terrible argument that does not seem to have any basis on how the real world operates.