I’m writing an article about short-term rentals, or “hone-sharing”. But it’s not only our homes: people are also renting out their own private cars, check out Turo or HyreCar. Why should you pay to park your car somewhere when instead you could be making money from it?
What ELSE have we got that we could monetize?
Instead of having to pay to board our pets, f’rinstance, could we rent them out while we’re on vacation?
And why pay for babysitting, when there are people out there who might be happy to pay you to let them play at parenthood for a weekend?
(With regard to children, if that seems horrifying, ask yourself which is more likely: that someone you re paying would be dangerous to your children, or that someone who is paying you would be? )
Dear polymaths, I’m afraid the very ideas of private property , of a private sphere, are breaking down. It’s horrifying to me. Is it to you?
“Rent-A-Kid” is an interesting idea – you should get it patented, start a business, get some wealthy investors, and work towards the Initial Placement on the stock market. Just one thing – build in a hard & fast rule that no kid would ever be rented to anyone called Biden.
The question is what are the people who are renting out their private property doing with the money? What do they want that is more valuable to them to make the various inconveniences involved worthwhile? It may be the answer is that they do not own the car they are renting out anyway – it is not really their private property. Most likely, they are paying off a big loan on the car, and need the revenues from renting it out to make the monthly payments.
Bottom line – some people want private property, other people want to live above their means. There is room for both … for now.
There’s also “rental arbitrage” in connection with home-sharing, where the entrepreneur takes a long term lease then rents the property out short-term. Most of the ordinances I’ve seen prohibit that: only the owner can get a short term rental license. But if I were a landlord, Id cover this potentiality in my lease, at least make sure Id get a cut.
I also think Rent A Kid has legs. Perfect for those that want to act like they have a perfect life. Look at our little family camping out. Nobody needs to know they rented the kid, the Airstream and the dog. Could be a package deal.
Could get a deal with Carnival Cruise. Take a cruise and Rent A Kid. The real parents earn enough for the cruise and the fake parents can take the kid back when they/them start acting up.
Rent A Kid. All the benefits of having children without the cost. Saving the environment without losing those precious life experiences. You really can have it all. The hell with own nothing and be happy. Have nothing and gain Instagram followers.
Studies from Dr Makeitup from Harvard have shown that one child can meet the emotional needs of eight couples and would result in the reduction of 150 trillion tons of CO2.
Everyone can have the epitaph “consumer unit”, but you must rent your gravestone and gravesite. We don’t encourage cremation as burning of the body is a CO2 generator. We rent gravesites that allow us to get carbon credits for the carbon sequestration. Although not encouraged, we have partnered with many that will rent the excess space in their urn.
@1789Libertarian That is from Ida Auken’s now notorious essay written for the WEF. But what I’m wondering, is whether this “no ownership” trend IS really being forced on us from above, or whether it my be more of a grass-roots movement.,
And @Mettelus , about the idea of renting graves: in Europe I think the max you can be in one is 15 years, maybe 25 in Switzerland. (What do they do with the exhumed charnel?). Anyway, our family has owned a certain plot for over 100 years, and a lot of the gravespace is just sitting there! Think how many decedents coulda gone in and out, for a fee, over all that time. Seriously.
It’s both Hyp. They are using the power of propaganda to persuade folks to give all this up. Those of us who don’t comply will be forced. It’s that simple. Think Covid jabs: take the slurry or lose your job. Same thing here.
So you think it’s like the Flood, water coming not only from above, but lo, the” fountains of the deep” have been opened? That’s what I’m afraid of, too.
But the whole idea of private property is that when you own it, you can do anything you wish with it, without Big Brother or Nanny Sister telling you what you can or cannot do. Certainly, that should include renting it out to generate some revenue or hypothecating it to extract some of the liquidity tied up in its capital value. If I owned a self-driving car (the real thing, which doesn’t exist at the present time but may in a few years), I’d think it a wonderful idea to have it on the road generating income for me the 95% of the time I am not using it myself. Further, if there were a population of these cars (Fourmilab prediction: we’ll call them “autos”) plying the streets looking for business, I would much prefer to summon one to take me where I want to go instead of tying up my capital in a car, worrying about maintenance, license and insurance, inspections, or having the thing spontaneously go up in flames and burn down my house.
Similarly, the rent or buy decision for a lot of people is not a matter of identity or autonomy but rather practicality and economics. You’ll probably want to own a vacuum cleaner, since you tend to need it at random times, such as when the cat knocks your Ming vase off the table, but most people will prefer to rent a ditch witch or jackhammer on those occasions the need arises for one rather than tie up capital in something used only rarely.
Okay, I do own a 1.6 tonne overhead travelling crane, but it’s difficult to rent one when you need it.
This is a scam being perpetrated in some countries by the criminal mafia we call government.
One of the key aspects that sets humans apart from animals is that we bury our dead. Not in all cultures, but most, at least as an option apart from cremation. The burial ground is sacred, and disturbing one is an act against God. Even an atheist would be loath to do such a thing. The perps know all this. Their scam works because they’re good at frightening people into agreeing that the grave is rented and must be paid for. Never give in to these creeps. The case will never go to court, but if it did, you’re guaranteed to win. You have no rental contract, you do not occupy the “property”.
OTOH, burial space may, indeed, be becoming short, so more “valuable”. Take the military burial grounds in DC - Arlington Cemetery. They have now been “out of space” for some time, so they have taken to burying people several deep. Such approaches are also seen in Europe, where space is scarce.
Yes, every time I go last a big cemetery I wonder how much longer we’ll be allowing burials.
It reminds me of the old monasteries. Every monk wanted to be buried in the consecrated ground, so they were, but not for long. Then the charnel was then taken out and they made chapels lined with skulls.
What if everybody in the world who dies HAS to be cremated? Is that even possible, and wouldn’t it cause a lotta air pollution?
No, I come down on the side of property rights, too. Like with the short term rentals, if it’s a nuisance, call the police.
What I was gettin at was more a change in attitude toward privacy, I think. It seems to me it is—was—a big part of our national character. I mean even small houses here are bigger than the space many Europeans live in. We’re used to “elbow room” both inside and outside our homes.
Is it sad if we don’t feel that way any more?
Idk—maybe it isn’t, maybe it’s just the wheel of the world in rotation.
Just remember in the US any information you deem private can freely be handed to the government by a third party. Even more to the point, the government can go to any third party and demand it turn over info about you all without a warrant. It’s all part of surveillance.
I suspect that all is part and parcel of the far more mobile society we currently have. With that has come a general degradation of family and faith. ?Why should privacy remain the same.
