The sharing economy - the solution for better access to affordable services, but at what price?

In recent years we have witnessed the apparition of new services which aim to help the greatest number of people to be able to use a new kind of services in order to facilitate their life. 

Two different elements are shaping this new phenomenon. Firstly the spirit of reciprocity is very important given that it means that there is no desire to make big profits in the provider/customer relation. Nowadays more and more people associate the term of the sharing economy to the emergence of virtual platforms that use new technologies to facilitate the link between consumers and individuals that provide a specific service.

The platform is used to create the virtual link between demand and supply so it is more appropriate to talk about the platform economy today.

Some diverse examples of the sharing economy

Airbnb

Airbnb is the most relevant example when thinking about the sharing economy. It is an American firm founded in 2008 and based in San Francisco, California. It consists in renting an individual room, apartment or house at a reasonable price to avoid using traditional services such as hotels or hostels. Customers are offered much more than a simple bed - they can chat with other people sharing the accommodation, share a meal or even hanging out with them to discover the city they are staying in. It has gained a worldwide reputation and is used by millions of people throughout the world. In March 2017, its capitalization reached 31 billion dollars.

Even though its model has quickly expanded to the five continents, the group has encountered several controversies, for instance in Paris, which remains the most profitable Airbnb city in the world as for 2017. The company announced in 2015 that they would be collecting a tourist tax from this time. The regulation in Spain also differs from the French one. In Barcelona a 65-cent niglthy tax has been implemented, which is of 45 cents outside the Catalan capital.

The group is also trying to remove barriers in its American market, in the US, more particularly in New York City, it has announced that it would pay a sort of staying tax to legalize accommodation renting under 30 days.

Uber

Uber, the American transport service based on passenger cars with drivers, established in 2009 and also based in San Francisco, is another great example that comes to mind for many people when reffering to the sharing economy. It provides a service that promotes free competition, however it faced a number of controversies, as Airbnb did, concerning its ethics. Many professional taxi drivers as well as public authorities have accused the group of practicing unfair competition and hidden work.

These hindrances did not prevent Uber from expanding its market influence by diversifying - it has created subsidiaries, like UberEATS, which enables people to order their favourite food directly from home and have it delivered at their front door.

A new term has been used to talk about the strategy of diversification Uber used - uberisation, which consists of the use of platforms connecting customers and professionals thanks to progress in new technologies.

                             

Blablacar

Blablacar is a French carpooling service created in 2004, which became a fee-paying service from 2011 on.  It enjoys less popularity than  Airbnb and Uber, because of its geographical zone of influence which is less developed than Airbnb's and Uber's. It is nevertheless the world leader for carpooling.  It has come to life using a slightly different model -  it includes the participation of the customer in the expenses necessary to provide the service. Blablacar's system resides in its customers paying part of the gasoline used for the journey directly to the driver. The latter cannot make any profit from it.

These models, although they have been subject to heavy criticisms, have made their way to become leaders in the reshaping of the traditional economic system. 

Léo Gubien

Sources

* ING Belgique, 3/02/17, L'économie du partage, qu'est-ce que c'est? https://www.ing.be/fr/business/my-business/sharing-economy (online)

* Le Parisien, 11/08/17 AIrbnb: A Paris, les amendes infligées aux loueurs de meublés touristiques explosent http://www.leparisien.fr/economie/airbnb-a-paris-les-amendes-infligees-aux-loueurs-de-meubles-touristiques-explosent-11-08-2017-7186869.php (online)

* Uber France https://www.uber.com/fr/

* Blablacar France https://www.blablacar.fr/