
Elon Musk may be a pain, but that doesn’t mean his ideas are crazy - hhs
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/26/elon-musk-may-be-a-pain-but-that-doesnt-mean-his-ideas-are-crazy
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NotPaidToPost
That idea has been floated since as long as self-driving cars became a
realistic prospect.

People love their cars and consider them a private space. I don't see many
people agreeing to let any random person do who knows what in them...

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__d
See [https://www.carnextdoor.com.au](https://www.carnextdoor.com.au) for some
evidence that there exist people who are perfectly happy to allow random
people do who knows what in their cars.

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

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__d
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?

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NotPaidToPost
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...

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__d
> 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?

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tlb
Could regular car owners farm their cars out as regular taxis? It doesn't seem
compelling.

The only value that car owners are providing in this scenario are capital (the
cost of the car) and maintenance. The capital for a self-driving taxi is more
than a regular taxi, but otherwise it's similar. Both capital and maintenance
can be provided more efficiently in bulk than in a cottage industry model.

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__d
I agree that the economics here are interesting. I think it's useful to
consider firstly car sharing, without the autonomous aspect.

I think it's a pretty compelling argument for many car owners whose capital is
otherwise tied up in a mostly unproductive asset. Particularly in the case
where you end up paying for parking during some of this unproductive time.

For the service provider, I think ultimately you're looking at the cost of
supplying a vehicle to transport your customer. Where the car is shared, can
that cost be lower than if it's a dedicated vehicle? I think it can, because
for car owners willing to share, any income is a bonus. It just has to be
enough to overcome any inconvenience to make it worthwhile.

And I think that's the point that your "cottage industry" comment misses: the
costs of capital and maintenance are immaterial to the service provider. All
they need to pay to overcome is the inconvenience and any psychological "yuck"
factor.

