[Findeton]

No, that problem was not generated by Airbnb. There’s growing demand and, because of regulation, not enough is built every year. For example, according to INE, 250k new families are formed in Spain (more than 500k people) and only 100k new houses/flats are built and the yearly deficit has been accumulating for 12 years. That is the real issue and blaming corporations is just the politicians’ easy path to deflect blame, which unfortunately too many citizens eagerly buy into.

[tsimionescu]

Even if it were true that the problem of housing affordability was not affected by Airbnb (it's not, at best it only exacerbated an existing problem), that would not mean it didn't create other problems for cities. Having tourists concentrated in places that are not designed for it, where a hotel license would never have been issued; the problem of too many tourist accommodations, causing an overflow of tourism; problems for neighbors with parties and similar nuissances; problems with untaxed income from the smaller owners; and probably others I'm forgetting.

[Findeton]

I know the Spanish case. The hotel lobby does not only push for airbnb restrictions but also for banning new hotels (so that they can push prices up). For example famously there are no new airbnb or hotel licenses since more than 10 years and obviously the problem has only worsened. Regardless, the problem is in general still a demand that grows roughly at 2.5x the supply growth rate.

[tsimionescu]

Are the boulevards, museums, parks etc growing as well? If not, why should the number of hotels grow? A city generally has a limited capacity for tourism (one which is not primarily related to the number of hotel rooms) and once that is reached, it becomes detrimental to increase tourist accommodations. I don't know if this is the specific case in one specific city that you have in mind, but the principle is there - expanding tourist accommodations is not a good in and of itself. Supply is naturally constrained, regardless of demand, for many real goods, and this is one of them.

Additionally, you keep ignoring the fact that even if new housing supply would be very important, Airbnb is still a drain. If demand was outpacing supply 2.5x before Airbnb, and it's outpacing it 3x now, that is still Airbnb making a bad problem worse.

[ahartmetz]

You can exacerbate a problem (which Airbnb is doing) without being its major cause. Doing that is still bad.

[hilariously]

Externalize all the problems, but its "not cheating!" - its just making us all pay for your growth while you take advantage of the current structure of society and generally making things worse.

[ahartmetz]

Jerk arbitrage