Thoughts on Airbnb’s war against the city of New York
I was deeply moved reading the story of Ada Garbutt, a New Yorker diagnosed with cancer and how Airbnb helped him bear the costs of his treatment, his life costs and his returning back to a normal state of living in a city that is getting more expensive every day (read the full story here).
To put matter in perspective, the state legislators of Albany are rushing to pass a bill in the final few days of the session that would severely penalize everyday New Yorkers for advertising the rental of their home for fewer than 30 days. It’s based on a 2010 state law that banned short-term apartment rentals of less than a month specifically to target unscrupulous landlords who would buy up apartments and operate illegal hotels.
The bill in its essence does nothing to prevent the illegal hotel operators in NYC, it merely hits on the thousands lower middle class New Yorkers whose properties are already responsible for injecting 2 billion dollars into the local economies in 2015, thanks to the company which is most affected by this.
As we speak, Airbnb which is the most affected in this scenario is running a tough battle mobilizing it’s strong community to voice against this decision and allow for a world of more sharing and interconnectedness. NYC is not the only battling front. The company is simultaneously running another one in San Francisco. A new local rule requiring hosts to register with the city which most hosts had ignored it. Now San Francisco supervisors planned to fine the home-sharing website $1000 per day for each unregistered host.
Such scenarios where the political leaders refuse to lend voice to tech companies which drives the growth of an economy so thirsty for new job creation are unfortunate even imprudent. Somehow I couldn’t stand not linking this to the Brexit event and the remarkable similarity the two of them have in their core.
Britain’s decision to abandon the European Union was a decision of her old men, that part of her citizenship which has barely felt the benediction of a new globalized, interconnected, more sharing world. In comparison, over 75% of Britishers up to the age of 25 years declared that they want to remain within the Union.
Both these events have one thing in common. Both represent a clash between the younger, the newer, the bolder, more spiritualized and sharing generation and the grandpas of status quo.
New York and most of the USA is getting more and more polarized, the nation ridden with debt thanks to the financialization of our industry which causes an entire middle class disappear making people barely able to make their ends meet. The old grandpas seem to have felt the threat coming from technology and unity of an emboldened generation more sensitive to the problems that plague our world today and they hit back. Airbnb and Uber the epitomes of innovation and sharing economy are constantly under attack by conservative elements and our overall institutional layer resembling fossilized remnant of the Industrial revolution that simply cannot catch fast enough with innovation. Longer time for adjustment could have been given for non-existing rules of a new industry to be written had our economy and our people didn’t need new jobs and new opportunities fast.
Similar circumstances marked the Brexit event. The biggest ambassadors of a more closed, nationalized economy were those who benefited it the most from a more open society.
This is one more proof that the world is getting into a threatening new age which must be counteracted by all of us. India or USA the challenge is the same. There are still many who would prefer to keep the rest in darkness of ignorance and scarcity of opportunities — in other words against the sharing economy.
Your thoughts?
