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Essay / The sharing economy in China: uncovering the sector's problems and bottlenecks
Table of contentsBrief summaryIntroductionThe sharing economy in ChinaReal and false bottlenecks1. First, the asset model hinders the development of the industry.2. Second, the lack of supervision calls into question human nature and the hidden danger of security.ConclusionRecommendationsReferencesBrief summary“In the last century, owning things was the marker of the middle class. » This sentence from Bernard Marr illustrates that people evaluated the social class of others based on the number of things they owned: the more wealth a person possesses, the higher class they belong. With the industrial revolution and technological advancements, the cost of manufacturing has decreased enormously today, this standard has been eliminated and the trend of owning fewer things is becoming popular among millennials with the emergence of the "minimalist" movement, digitalization and sharing economies. In this article, the focus will be on the shared economy in China, with an introduction of the shared economy at first, followed by a specific perspective in China, uncovering the problems and bottlenecks of the sector with Chinese examples; finally, based on the issues identified, recommendations will be given at the end of the document. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayIntroductionThe term sharing economy first appeared in 1978 when Marcus Felson and Joe L. Spaeth introduced the concept sharing your unused resources (time, goods) with people in need, with additional added value while obtaining material or immaterial returns. After years of development, the sharing economy that people understand today has become a socio-economic ecosystem focused on sharing human, physical goods. and intellectual resources. It involves the shared process of creation, production, distribution, exchange and consumption of goods and services by different people and organizations. And we can see that the main characteristics of the shared business model have the following three points: First, use the Internet to build an information platform. Breaking the information asymmetry between supply and demand, connecting both parties quickly and efficiently, improving the chances of closing a deal and reducing search costs. Second, consider the temporary transfer of the right to use unused resources as the very essence. He advocates the separation of property and right of use. Third, attach importance to repeated trade and efficient use of goods. Repetitive use of resources makes it possible to reconfigure, integrate and optimize unused resources across different transactions. It is essential to maximize utility and promote individual well-being and the green and sustainable development of society as a whole. The most representative examples could be Airbnb for accommodation, Uber and BlaBla Car for transportation. China's sharing economy In recent years, with the popularity of the sharing economy, the national shared economy has seen unprecedented prosperity, from bicycles to cars, portable batteries to umbrellas; the tentacles of the shared economy reach almost all kinds of scenarios. At the same time, in the face of the crazy influx of capital, the growth of the sharing economy is almost madness. As we can see, the three main areas of shared economy in China are transportation,life services and production capacity in 2016 and this remains the first. same until now. The size of China's shared economic transactions in 2018 was 2.942 trillion yuan, an increase of 41.6% from the previous year and involving more than 760 million people, and it will continue to grow at an annual rate of more than 30% according to state information. Center. To find the driving force behind this trend, we have to go back to 2016, when shared bikes started the trend. People can find the nearest bike through an app and rent it by scanning the code and they can park it anywhere on the street, to facilitate the next user. Two leading companies in this field are Mobike and Ofo. Another most used platform is called Didi Chuxing, it works similarly to Uber and took over Uber's business in China in 2016 with an exchange of 18% of the company's shares in return, since then Didi Chuxing has almost dominated the Chinese market. Real VS FalseThe real sharing economy should be based on sharing existing unused goods of individuals, i.e. reducing the costs and expenses of the whole society and individuals by maximizing the efficiency of utilization of unused resources. Such a sharing economy provides additional revenue to resource owners and reduces user expenses, with a slight negative impact on other third parties, in economic terms called “Pareto improvement”. However, when it comes to the current shared economy model, we rarely see an increase in the efficiency of using existing idle goods, because the concept is defined differently. In China, “Sharing” refers to any short-term rental of resources activated by a smartphone. April Rinne, advisor and member of China's National Commission on the Sharing Economy, says she is pleased that China considers the sharing economy a "national priority", but after finding it meaningless given that the economy shared is so broadly defined and transactional. , because China even considers Amazon to be part of the sharing economy. We need to understand the difference between “sharing” and “creating” unused goods or services. Taking shared bikes as an example, companies have focused entirely on "increments" rather than "stock", they have grown on the basis of mass manufacturing of new bikes by various suppliers; Additionally, instead of truly “sharing,” companies compete to enter the market. Mobike and Ofo both owned around 150,000 bikes in Beijing at the start of 2017, a figure that rose to 2 million by the end of the year, according to public reports. Nationwide, the total number of shared bikes in major cities is in the tens of millions. As a direct result, failure to fully utilize resources has resulted in considerable waste, as bike sharing on urban streets has invaded and occupied public space. First, the asset model hinders the development of the industry. At present, most of the domestic sharing economy is capital-driven, both bicycle sharing and car sharing. In order to quickly capture market share and customers, companies spend money on a large scale, with extremely high costs. Once they have financing difficulties, the capital chain will inevitably suffer a break, and the sharing platform will not be able to bear all kinds of high expenses. Ofo and Mobike have raised $2.2 billion in capital and are valued at over $4 billion in 2017. They are burning withmoney to compete with others. The same strategy was used by Didi Chuxing when they were competing with Uber, both sides were burning money. to invest, waging a price war to gain more market share, Uber lost $2 billion, and Didi even spent more, they raised billions to replace Uber. While Didi received funding from Alibaba and Tencent, Uber abandoned its China expansion to avoid further losses. Oscar Ramos, program director at Chinaccelerator, says that "a lot of money kills startups, when you have too much money, you solve problems with money, not with creativity." This is the true image of Chinese companies, lacking creativity and full of money, they simply buy and make money instead of investing in innovation and intellectual property.2. Second, the lack of control calls into question human nature and the hidden danger of security. On the one hand, the existing shared economy model tests humanity to a certain extent, which can be explained by the theory of "tragedy of the commons" in economics. . Due to the lack of clarity of property rights and the absence of strict regulation, each user is more inclined to overuse public resources without worrying about any punishment for excessive use of public resources, leading to resource depletion , and everyone will be left without profit. Current shared bikes are a classic modern version of the tragedy of the commons, where the per person cost of error is high. ridership is extremely low due to a lack of regulation, so the number of damaged bikes is everywhere. Another example could be an umbrella-sharing business, hailed by the People's Daily as "a demonstration of human care, releasing the heat of the city." A few weeks later, nearly 300,000 stocks of umbrellas distributed by a new company called Sharing E Umbrella had been either lost or stolen. On the other hand, platform supervision is not well established so dramas frequently arise. Taking the online car rental platform Didi as an example, it tends to recruit as many drivers as possible to maximize profits, but ignores the strict examination of the driver's personal background and quality. As a result, the criminal risk (sexual harassment, rape, theft and murder) has increased, and when problems arise, customers will inevitably lose large areas or use them less frequently, which is extremely disadvantageous to the survival and profitability of businesses. shared economic platforms. mind: This is just a sample.Get a custom article from our expert writers now.Get a custom essayConclusionFrom the perspective of green and sustainable development ideals, or the demand for business model innovation and resolution of overcapacity, the sharing economy is the trend of The future is unstoppable, as the Chinese State Information Center estimates that by 2020, the sharing economy sector could account for 10% of GDP growth. Although the current development of the industry is facing problems and difficulties, but from another point of view, pressure = motivation. This may be an excellent time for adjustment and optimization of the shared economic sector. Recommendations It is necessary for platforms to modify their business operations. By deepening the essence of sharing and carrying out market research or big data analysis, identifying the real needs of users and how to share products to :. 2019].