r/technology • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 • 8h ago

Society New Airbnb rules ban hosts from making guests wash dishes, do laundry & other checkout chores

https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/new-airbnb-rules-ban-hosts-from-making-guests-wash-dishes-do-laundry-other-checkout-chores-3420832/
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u/stevedore2024 8h ago

The whole point of the gig economy was to shift all the costly complexity and overhead to little part-timers. Insurance, you're on your own. Repairs, you're on your own. Certification is irrelevant, restrictions are irrelevant, regulation is irrelevant, medallions (taxi licenses) are irrelevant, just break all the norms that have been instituted for the old generation of industry by charging less at first, then raise the prices so the profits flow to the centralized corpo-lords and not the gig workers left holding the bag. And then the public will get even more angry when the gig workers strike back and demand more, but the corpo-lords have already vested and moved onto the next thing they can ruin.

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u/nulla-nomen-eius 4h ago

profits flow to the centralized corpo-lords and not the gig workers left holding the bag

I honestly cannot understand the financials for Door Dash.

I ordered something today, I paid about $6 more than I would if I went there myself (without tip). I add a $5 tip to a $20 meal which is probably generous I think? How much would that driver receive if I hadn't added the $5? I don't think restaurants are doing heavy discounting for Door Dash, so I'd guess all their margin and payment to their gig driver is within the $6-8 on my $20 meal... so as the driver you have to get to the location, which might take you 10+ minutes and several miles... you have to park... you have to go in... you often have to wait for the food... then you drive another 10+ minutes and several miles to drop the food off which may take time if the orderer isn't watching/waiting. So you spend at least 20-25 minutes on this effort and you made what? $3-4? Even if you add $5 tip that's $8-9... you complete 2-3 of these in an hour and best case you're getting $16-27 for that hour, but you're also paying for fuel and consuming your vehicle... it just doesn't seem like a worthwhile thing unless every delivery is the ideal, which I'm sure they are not.

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u/Sexual_Congressman 3h ago

Doordash doesn't have "tips", the thing the app calls a tip is actually a bribe, since the driver can see it before they get your stuff and you can't take it back. In certain places, you won't get your order unless you offer the maximum bribe. Also, people who do it regularly aren't taking orders from some place they don't know on the other side of town to some other place 10 miles away.

The 20 or so doordash orders I've made were all fulfilled by someone who was already within half a mile of the source.

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u/nohandsfootball 1h ago

Ideally they're batching order deliveries, which would 2x-3x that per trip, maybe more depending on the restaurant / area. The drivers who come to my building often come with deliveries for others inside the building, But I live in an SF high rise, so the economics here are probably a bit different than more spread out areas.