The Sharing Economy: “it’s not sharing if you have to pay for it”

The phrase “The Sharing Economy” is being treated increasingly negatively in the media, as it is no longer thought to accurately explain the businesses that fall under this particular industry umbrella. Many reports recently, such as these pieces in the Harvard Business Review and The Guardian, discuss “why the term ‘sharing economy’ needs to die”. The author of the Guardian piece, Alex Hern, quite rightly points out that: “it’s not sharing if you have to pay for it”, and supports a growing movement to classify the likes of Airbnb, Uber, and TaskRabbit as “access economy” companies, rather than sharing economy ones.

Gorenflo says this is a classic example of corporations coopting the feel-good language of social activism.

The phrase "sharing economy" is particularly powerful, says Giana Eckhardt, a professor of marketing at Royal Holloway, University of London. She says, "It facilitates consumers believing they’re part of a larger movement."

Ironically, Eckhardt says instead of being about conservation, the phrase now puts a whole new positive spin on consumption. You are not paying for a ride or a room, you’re part of a community, sharing.

'The sharing economy facilitates consumers believing they’re part of a larger movement.' Marketing professor Giana Eckhardt

Eckhardt says, "People want to believe that the consumption activities that they’re doing have a larger purpose."

Eckhardt is one of many pundits and reporters trying to kill the “sharing economy” label. She wrote this piece in the Harvard Business Review urging people to do just that. Since then, others, like Alex Hern, have spoken out against the phrase.

Hern reports on tech for The Guardian newspaper in England. He wrote this op-ed titled, "Why the term 'sharing economy' needs to die." He says the argument is so simple that even little kids would understand. Paying is not sharing.

"You’d be a very odd parent if you did tell your child, 'Remember you have to share your toys with your sister and she has to pay you the market rate for what those toys are worth.' " Alex Hern, The Guardian tech reporter

Hern says, "You’d be a very odd parent if you did tell your child ‘remember you have to share your toys with your sister and she has to pay you the market rate for what those toys are worth.’"

People like Hern are pushing for new terms: the on-demand economy, or the access economy. Hern uses gig economy, which he says focuses on the people actually doing the work for companies like Uber and TaskRabbit.

Hern says, "It’s both more accurate and it highlights to me what is the most important aspect of these companies, which is their relationship to labor."

Hern says the media are really to blame for the phrase getting out of control. He says reporters jumped on the sharing economy trend after the financial crisis. Then they started using the term for all kinds of new tech companies. Now, Hern says it’s hard for news outlets to stop using it.

'It’s a term that’s widely understood. It’s not going anywhere soon.' Alex Hern, The Guardian tech reporter

"It’s a term that’s widely understood," Hern says, "It’s used to refer to hundreds of billions of dollars worth of companies. It’s not going anywhere soon."

It is entrenched. All you need to do to see that is search for the phrase in a dictionary.

Katherine Connor Martin is the head of U.S. dictionaries at Oxford University Press. She says, "Sharing economy was on the shortlist for the Oxford Dictionary’s word of the year for 2015."

The sharing economy is 'an economic system in which assets or services are shared between private individuals either for free or for a fee typically by means of the Internet.' Online Oxford English Dictionary

The term is in the online version of the Oxford Dictionary. The sharing economy is defined as "an economic system in which assets or services are shared between private individuals either for free or for a fee typically by means of the Internet."

Yes, the online Oxford Dictionary officially defines paying for something as part of the sharing economy, as does Webster’s and other dictionaries.

Martin says, "If people who are passionate about this shame the media into no longer using the word this way, and use it in a more restrictive way, then we would be obliged to reflect that change."

Neal Gorenflo has been trying to do this for five years to no avail. He and others in the original sharing economy have started giving up on the phrase. Now, they’ve got a new name: "Platform-cooperativism."

Gorenflo admits that it's not quite as sexy as “the sharing economy." Then again, if it were that good, a corporation would probably come along and scoop it up.