4 ms·

Of course "there exists people who will <replace with anything>". The point is that this is marginal. Dedicated taxis will overwhelmingly dominate.

__d 7y ago
When I first heard this idea, my feeling was that the set of people willing to share their car is small. I know that my car has my stuff in it, and I'd need to take that out and return it every time I used the car, and that'd suck. But as evidence that the set might be a little larger than I initially thought, I offer an apparently successful business operating today which relies upon people sharing their vehicles. AirBnB might be a useful data point here though. I don't know what the percentage of dedicated vs shared accommodation is there, but it seems likely to be similar for cars?
- NotPaidToPost 7y ago
  Well, interestingly if the concept became popular it would bankrupt itself through an oversupply of taxis. As for AirBnB, it's mostly a platform for dedicated rentals these days...
  - __d 7y ago
    > Well, interestingly if the concept became popular it would > bankrupt itself through an oversupply of taxis. I'm not sure that'd be the outcome? If many/most people who own a vehicle make it available for shared use, then I guess there'd be price competition. If willingness to offer your vehicle was (a) motivated by price and (b) varied in its degree, you'd presumably hit a point where some people couldn't be bothered, and would withdraw from the system, reducing supply again. There's no real downside to the service provider of having more vehicles available, assuming their systems scale with minimal cost. I guess the question is whether the price point at which people become unwilling to share their vehicles is higher or lower than the cost of capital and maintenance for a dedicated taxi service. Which seems like it's a sufficiently difficult thing to predict that testing it in the market is probably the right answer :-) > As for AirBnB, it's mostly a platform for dedicated > rentals these days... That's my impression too. Which is a data point kinda in favour of the "dedicated" model. I'm not sure how the "tool sharing" businesses are going -- they might be another useful input?

__d 7y ago

When I first heard this idea, my feeling was that the set of people willing to share their car is small. I know that my car has my stuff in it, and I'd need to take that out and return it every time I used the car, and that'd suck. But as evidence that the set might be a little larger than I initially thought, I offer an apparently successful business operating today which relies upon people sharing their vehicles. AirBnB might be a useful data point here though. I don't know what the percentage of dedicated vs shared accommodation is there, but it seems likely to be similar for cars?

NotPaidToPost 7y ago
Well, interestingly if the concept became popular it would bankrupt itself through an oversupply of taxis. As for AirBnB, it's mostly a platform for dedicated rentals these days...
- __d 7y ago
  > Well, interestingly if the concept became popular it would > bankrupt itself through an oversupply of taxis. I'm not sure that'd be the outcome? If many/most people who own a vehicle make it available for shared use, then I guess there'd be price competition. If willingness to offer your vehicle was (a) motivated by price and (b) varied in its degree, you'd presumably hit a point where some people couldn't be bothered, and would withdraw from the system, reducing supply again. There's no real downside to the service provider of having more vehicles available, assuming their systems scale with minimal cost. I guess the question is whether the price point at which people become unwilling to share their vehicles is higher or lower than the cost of capital and maintenance for a dedicated taxi service. Which seems like it's a sufficiently difficult thing to predict that testing it in the market is probably the right answer :-) > As for AirBnB, it's mostly a platform for dedicated > rentals these days... That's my impression too. Which is a data point kinda in favour of the "dedicated" model. I'm not sure how the "tool sharing" businesses are going -- they might be another useful input?