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Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

oregonlive.com

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Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#561

Post by wittyreference »

dmix wrote: post #413
SheinhardtWigCo wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the 15-20% tip, of which the restaurant staff aren't getting a cent.

Don't you normally tip the driver for deliveries? I've never tipped a restaurant for take out or delivery normally...

I stopped tipping with DD.

I used to tip, when delivery was "free" (included in the menu price).

But DD jacks up the menu price (which, at least around here, is already increased to account for their own direct delivery service - they use DD to source more customers) and then adds a delivery fee - if I'm paying that much more of a premium to use a specific delivery person, I don't really feel I owe them a gratuity on top of it.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#562

Post by wittyreference »

austhrow743 wrote: post #221
colinmhayes wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why people in central areas of the city order delivery. There are 10 amazing restaurants within easy walking distance of me, why order delivery when I can walk for 5 minutes instead?

5 minute walk then 20 minute wait then 5 minute walk back. When you're earning $50+ an hour, which many in cities are easily clearing, it starts to make a lot of sense to pay someone else to do your waiting for you.

Speaking from when I lived in the middle of a major city:

I am working and/or enjoying highly limited relaxation time. I am willing to pay a premium to have the food arrive, and have the time surrounding "getting food in hand" be minimized, so as to minimize work interruption or maximize current recreational activity.

It's essentially the opportunity cost argument, applied to utility measure rather than literal dollars.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#563

Post by wittyreference »

scarface74 wrote: post #469
austhrow743 wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

5 minute walk then 20 minute wait then 5 minute walk back. When you're earning $50+ an hour, which many in cities are easily clearing, it starts to make a lot of sense to pay someone else to do your waiting for you.

I hate this line of reasoning and so do many economists. It’s not the “opportunity cost” you should be measuring. It’s the “opportunity cost of the next best alternative.” If I am an hourly worker making $50 and going to get food would be an hour that I wouldn’t be working, then yes it is worth $50 to not spend it going to get food. But if I am choosing between watching Netflix and going to get food. The next best al…

I don't understand why economists would hate it. The opportunity cost doesn't have to be dollars - it could be in universal "utility measure" units. If I value the utility measure of what I'm giving up to get food > than I value the utility measure of the cost of delivery, I don't want to give up that utility to go get food.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#564

Post by scarface74 »

wittyreference wrote: post #563
scarface74 wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate this line of reasoning and so do many economists. It’s not the “opportunity cost” you should be measuring. It’s the “opportunity cost of the next best alternative.” If I am an hourly worker making $50 and going to get food would be an hour that I wouldn’t be working, then yes it is worth $50 to not spend it going to get food. But if I am choosing between watching Netflix and going to get food. The next best al…

I don't understand why economists would hate it. The opportunity cost doesn't have to be dollars - it could be in universal "utility measure" units. If I value the utility measure of what I'm giving up to get food > than I value the utility measure of the cost of delivery, I don't want to give up that utility to go get food.

I am not saying that money is the end all be all.

I am saying that the intellectually honest reason is that “I have the money to spend on doing things I don’t want to do myself”. Not, “Because I make $50/hour, for 8 hours a day, my time is worth $50 and every hour I get back in my life is worth $50/hour”.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#565

Post by mindslight »

austhrow743 wrote: post #553
mindslight wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you aren't being paid hourly, this is utterly fallacious. If you are being paid hourly, you should be billing for thinking while walking down the street or taking a shower. That is some of your most productive time. Also as another commenter mentioned, cold food. Furthermore, avoiding all of the extra zero-use plastic waste they throw in the bag by default.

Most high earning people have the ability to influence their pay through expending time and effort.

Don't confuse spending time or effort with achieving results.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#566

Post by scarface74 »

cwilkes wrote: post #558
scarface74 wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that monetary compensation is not the sole economic value. But still “how much you could be making that hour” is also irrelevant in most cases. That’s the entire point.

No it is highly relevant. I’m “making” happiness by watching a film on Netflix instead of getting dressed, getting in the car, struggling to find parking, waiting for the order, and then driving back. This is an economic decision just One that not easily seen by dollars. I value a movie more than running errands.

And that still doesn’t have anything to do with the original thesis - “if I make $50/hour when I am working. That means I should value my time at $50/hour”. The opportunity cost is not $50/hour if you wouldn’t have been using that hour to work.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#567

Post by nybble41 »

scarface74 wrote: post #566
cwilkes wrote: post #558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it is highly relevant. I’m “making” happiness by watching a film on Netflix instead of getting dressed, getting in the car, struggling to find parking, waiting for the order, and then driving back. This is an economic decision just One that not easily seen by dollars. I value a movie more than running errands.

And that still doesn’t have anything to do with the original thesis - “if I make $50/hour when I am working. That means I should value my time at $50/hour”. The opportunity cost is not $50/hour if you wouldn’t have been using that hour to work.

> The opportunity cost is not $50/hour if you wouldn’t have been using that hour to work.

It is at least $50 per hour if you could have been using that time to work. Anything else that you choose to do instead of working is prima facie worth more to you than the $50 you could have been earning. The opportunity cost—the next best alternative—is either working and earning $50 or else something you value even more than $50.

You are attempting to claim the opposite: that if someone can make $50 per hour working, but chooses to do something else, then that time is somehow worth less than $50 per hour. This makes no sense at all. This would presume that the person knowingly and deliberately chooses the option which is less valuable from their own point of view.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#568

Post by pwinnski »

uedue828e wrote: post #353
pwinnski wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the middle of a pandemic, that's simply not true. Otherwise, sure, you just go get the food yourself in your ca--oh wait, ride hailing. In a taxi? On a bike? Within walking distance? But yes, just go to the restaurant, unless there's a global pandemic that requires many people to not leave their homes.

Did take out or kitchens stop existing in your world? Do you really think grubhub or uber is even a rounding error in terms of how the majority of people get their food? There's being out of touch but your comment is a whole new level of reality disconnect. And your comment doesn't even make sense internally. You can't avoid ridesharing but you can't leave your house? LOL okay.

Please, calm down, and keep the personal insults in check.

I have eaten food that was not cooked in my home no more than six times since February. All but one of those times were takeout. I'm well aware of how both kitchens and takeout work. I'm very privileged in that sense.

However, I was practicing empathy. Many people do not have the options I do, and I'm not sure mockery is the best way to think about them.

You mentioned both delivery and ride hailing in your initial comment, so I made the starting assumption that you were talking about someone who doesn't have a car. If you don't live within walking distance of a restaurant offering takeout, and you don't have a car, how do you get takeout?

In the suburbs where more than half of Americans live, access to restaurants within walking distance isn't ubiquitous. Many restaurants in my state remain closed, including in my case, both of the restaurants within walking distance.

So, much of America cannot eat out, and some percentage don't have cars or can't drive due to injury or fear of the pandemic. That leaves cooking at home, yes, from groceries they've had delivered or taken public transit (quite the disease vector) or via ride hailing. And it leaves food delivery.

GrubHub reported 22.6 million "active diners" in Q4 2019. That's a small number compared to everybody in America who eats, but it's not a tiny number. And GrubHub isn't the only food delivery company.

My bottom line is that it may be easy for you or I to avoid food delivery or ride hailing services, but that is simply not true for everyone, and it's not even a value shared by everyone.

If you want food delivery, and many people clearly do, it can be very hard to avoid GrubHub and Doordash due to their slimy and unethical practices. If you don't want food delivery, then clearly this issue has nothing whatsoever to do with you.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#569

Post by valuearb »

ceejayoz wrote: post #455
valuearb wrote: post #448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost in perfect correlation as one by one pre-existing condition limits were legislatively banned over the years. And ACA eliminated almost all remaining pre-existing conditions, so of course it drove insurance costs and pricing sky high.

Except it didn't. See Exhibit 1 at https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.2018.... . The "sky high" jump you portray doesn't exist. It's been a quite steady annual rise. If pre-existing conditions were the primary cause for premium increases, the ACA's one-fell-swoop removal of them would've had far more significant impact on that chart.

Limits on pre-existing conditions mainly affect individual policy pricing, corporate health insurance are already pooled and because of that always had fewer pre-existing condition limits.

Re: Portland approves 10% cap on fees that food delivery apps can charge restaurants

#570

Post by nerfhammer »

SahAssar wrote: post #555
nerfhammer wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In that other fold of the multiverse, the headline could be that uber is charging people extra in Treasure Island, which contains a lot of subsidized low-income housing.

They already do that for taxi rides, right? A longer taxi ride doesn't get magically cheaper because it's going to/from low income housing. It's all transportation, and transportation gets more expensive for a longer distance.

Well who would click on that article?
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