261–270 of 405 posts
Once the state becomes addicted to enforcement via big tech, it becomes reluctant to break up those big tech companies and promote competition.
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> There is not a big tourist tax here Seriously? Numbers I just googled show like 10-20 million tourists vs a metro population of 2.5 million and you guys have some of the highest taxes in the world? Why are you taxing yourself so much when you can tax the tourists because it is pretty much the opposite in most tourist places in the US?
> you guys have some of the highest taxes in the world? I moved to Amsterdam from NYC, and honestly the taxes are about the same, with NY city and state taxes taken into account.
As an example, a person making $100,000 would pay $22,754 in florida whereas someone in the netherlands making €86,176 would pay €32,989 in income taxes. Then you also need to factor in the 21% vat vs 6% sales tax. Also gas is $3.179 a gallon vs €7.158 a gallon. That's a pretty big tax difference!
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> There is a housing crisis in the Netherlands Is there any western city where there isn't a housing crisis?
Pretty much the entire midwest and southern US [0]. Granted, they benefit from basically having no geographical barriers to sprawling and building out ever more subdivisions and americans don't seem to mind suburbs. [0]: https://www.supermoney.com/inflation-adjusted-home-prices/
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> There is a housing crisis in the Netherlands Is there any western city where there isn't a housing crisis?
Perhaps there's something deeply wrong with western housing systems? I don't want to sound too radical, but this seems to be inextricably connected to capitalism. We won't ever solve it without structural changes. What Amsterdam is doing is a decent start at least.
Houses were the most commonly owned assets, so governments that increased the price of housing made most of the middle class richer, making those policies popular.
Re-formulating the above, making housing expensive is popular policy.
Doing that policy long enough causes new entrants into the market to not be able to afford housing. So yes, there is something wrong with our housing system. Part of that is that we marketed 'own your house' as a great way to earn money, and then made good on that promise at the expense of new entrants into the market.
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I wonder if we can make Yelp for taxis. Open the app, scan the plate, check the reviews, if they're bad, go to the next taxi. But I guess dodgy taxi drivers would just buy new license plate (e.g. for their "own" private cars) and swap them - ok in a lot of jurisdictions taxi plates look different to normal car plates. Or the taxi driver can be made aware of the bad reviews and they'd have to do a deal with the app us…
I know it's normal for taxi drivers here to own their taxi, and therefore be the only one who drives it - I wonder how common that is throughout the rest of the world? Are there places where different drivers might drive the same cab in shifts?
I have a 30+ day stay that had been booked close to 6 months in advanced canceled 7 days before my stay because the user sold their house. Airbnb said they would help me find a new comparable place. What they meant was they would send me a $200 gift card and say tough shit that all the comparable houses are booked already.
I hope they get regulated hard. Maybe someday they will start giving a shit about their users too.
Regulatory arbitrage of some sort seems to be involved in many recent digital business models. Whether it concerns or involves (lack of) data privacy regulation, "reinventing" labour contracts or undercutting taxation frameworks, it is a most cruel reminder of how poor the management of the commons. While many of the efficiencies and attractions of re-inventing various businesses for the "digital age" seem genuine, t…
> Regulatory arbitrage of some sort seems to be involved in many recent digital business models. Whether it concerns or involves (lack of) data privacy regulation, "reinventing" labour contracts or undercutting taxation frameworks, it is a most cruel reminder of how poor the management of the commons. Well here is the thing, in my country the majority of Airbnb rental are(at least were) illegal. Authorities knew this…
In my country taxi drivers also started to beat up Uber drivers, but it backfired hard on them, it only reinforced the notion that taxi drivers are dangerous, not to be trusted (after all, if they are the kind of person capable of randomly assaulting business competitor, they certainly are capable of assaulting a client in a disagreement, so why would I risk ride with them?), so the beatings helped steer the public opinion in favour of Uber, resulting in the legalization of Uber. Also, in my country breaking a minor (administrative/civil) law doesn't mean you are not protected by more important criminal law, so the victim Uber drivers did seek criminal charges against the offending Taxi drivers.
Interestingly, in the aftermath, the taxi lobby (which used to be fiercely anti-consumer) worked to reform taxi laws to be much more pro-consumer in order to compete with Uber, they lowered their prices, removed the ridiculous accessory fees (extra for baggage, extra for more than 2 passengers, ...), added a requirement for background checks for drivers (this was a important one), gps tracking of cars, ... . So official taxis actually got much better due to Uber.
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It hasn't "morphed" into anything. It always was a way to easy money (while lying through their teeth), but way too many people are naive and couldn't see it earlier.
> It always was a way to easy money Tell me again how Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Apple and Facebook were "easy money" The devil personified in here, Mark Zuckerberg turned down the most "easy money" ever. 1 billion in cash for a couple years old company with an unproven business model, very few paying customers and no moat to speak of. You gotta choose one, if extreme luck is involved in the process then it's not "ea…
So essentially 80% were not properly registered and paying taxes? I’m not that surprised, once a good double-digit number are cheating, cheating becomes the only viable way to remain competitive.
Nice twist. A country that is a tax heaven and enables a lot of business to avoid due taxes in other jurisdictions is now concerned that it can't get its own share of taxes.
(Note I think we should not be as much of a tax haven)