> I can see how a delivery can take, on average, one hour

In New York?

> will essentially kill these platforms

It will curtail them. They will need to trim their driver network, which will reduce the number of drivers and increase delivery times. Restaurants and consumers outside high-density areas no longer make sense to cater to. Dropping restaurants who don’t meet minimums will also, likely, be necessary. In summary, this is entirely solved with densification—food delivery in New York predates these platforms.

I can see it working in New York City (and closer denser areas) but these platforms operate in the broader US and other markets (which can have now laws influenced by the US).

Adopted nationally, this would absolutely kill the platforms as well as a number of restaurants. This law is particular to New York, whose density both makes it work and raises living costs.

Nobody forced them to use this business model. If it isn't profitable without exploiting workers, it was a bad idea to begin with.

> If it isn't profitable without exploiting workers

There are two classes of gig workers whose interests are at odds: the ersatz full time and true part time. The former, whom worker rights activists highlight, is being exploited. The latter, which companies like to talk about, benefit from a high-flexibility additional source of income.

The ratio of the former to the latter increases with density; there is more work to fill the hours. Below a certain level of density, the former cannot exist. It’s absolutely possible that the optimum for New York is not the same as in rural Kentucky, where outlawing the odd job an otherwise stay-at-home parent takes to earn extra cash does more harm than good.

Even in the kinda rural area I grew up in it was common for Italian restaurants to have their own delivery drivers. Many still do, because the customer experience of the delivery apps is often inferior. If we go back to a pre-food delivery app time, my general take would be "and nothing of value was lost." Restaurants will still be able to have their own delivery services, people will still be able to simply pick up their food. Getting your Hamburger from that special place across town (lukewarm) is nice, but it won't kill you if its not possible anymore.

> Getting your Hamburger from that special place across town (lukewarm) is nice, but it won't kill you if its not possible anymore

It might kill that special place across town, or at least cause it to reduce hours.

I suspect if the loss of these delivery drivers had such an impact on this hypothetical special place, they would hire their own delivery drivers to compensate. Worst case, you have to a call a number or use a mobile-friendly website instead of using an app.

If their existence is predicated on the exploitation of gig workers they should go under. The general demand for food won't be impacted by that one bit. Either people will be willing to pay more for their fancy burger or demand will shift to other businesses that can afford to pay their people a living wage.

EDITED TO ADD: Something that isn't often mentioned in these discussions is that the existence of businesses predicated on exploiting labour is narrowing the space for businesses that would be willing and able to compensate their workers fairly. Delivery apps are pricing out sustainable business models if they are allowed to skirt labour regulations, just like the common practice of Amazon and other companies treating delivery drivers as independent contractors.

But we don't go back because millions of customers use these apps every day. Just not HN apparently because people here are special.

The OP was talking about uber eats and similar apps potentially shutting down in New York if delivery drivers have to be paid minimum wage. None of these apps currently have a sustainable business model if they have to treat their drivers as employees under the laws of the local jurisdiction. Maybe they will adjust their business model if forced to comply with the law. Or they will shut down. Either way is fine with me.

Yep. Now do the math on living in NYC with a car payment making $7/h.

The alternative is restaurants hiring delivery drivers with reasonable ranges. There are a few of these in my area and I greatly prefer them. The food arrives on time and hot, every time.

> alternative is restaurants hiring delivery drivers with reasonable ranges

The next step would be restaurants near each other banding together to share a pool of delivery workers. In practice, I think that is what these platforms will become. The city divided into zones, each zone with a set of drivers, and consumers strongly encouraged to order from in zone.

Aren't these delivery apps intelligent enough to already group restaurants and nearby drivers together?

> Aren't these delivery apps intelligent enough to already group restaurants and nearby drivers together?

Yes. But there are clearly other factors of higher weight. I am not usually shown the closest restaurants first, but instead close enough restaurants.

We had ubiquitous fast and free local restaurant delivery in NYC for decades before these apps showed up.

> not really better now

Discoverability is better. There may be a niche for a non-profit app that identifies local restaurants with free delivery. A virtual hallway pile.

Yeah we have the internet now obviously. That’s orthogonal to having actual third party services delivering the food or taking a cut.

> we have the internet now obviously. That’s orthogonal to having actual third party services delivering the food or taking a cut

I don’t think local restaurant discovery, in the context of delivery, is a remotely solved problem outside the food-delivery apps.

That's nice, but the suburbs never had that unless you're ordering pizza or maybe Chinese food. A single restaurant needs a lot of volume to hire their own full-time driver. Amortizing a driver sitting on his couch to come to any restaurant in the area was a big change.

This article is about a dispute between these companies and New York City.

How does that compare with spending your time going out and picking up your food or taking your family to a restaurant? That has to be a minimum of 30-45 minutes of time spent traveling plus car or transit expenses. It might be more, but is it a lot more?

Sure. If you make $150/hour, it might make sense. But that's hardly the case for the average person.

The average person can do more things for themselves rather than rely on an army of underpaid immigrants to deliver their food.

Even for the average person, a $20 fee might not seem that crazy. Imagine it's night time, you live in a not great neighborhood, and you're a young woman. How much would you pay to avoid having to get on a bus, ride twelve stops, pick up your food, then wait for another bus to get you home?

I think the higher fee will push out the boundary of where average, healthy people are willing to travel, but it doesn't push it out great distances.

You could cook a meal for a family of 5 for ~ $20, likely way less. Unless its pizza, sounds like it'd be closer to $100+. Using these delivery apps feels akin to buying a bottle of water at a concert or alcohol from a hotel mini bar. One of the biggest rip offs out there.

It’s not a rip off, it’s the fact that having another person do everything for you is fundamentally too expensive unless there is a massive pay imbalance.

Unless you're loaded, its most def a rip off. After the restaurant gets their share, the government fee/taxes, employee wages, doordash fees, delivery driver wages ... 5-10% of the bill is actually food cost.

A rip off implies some kind of scam or unreasonable markup. Which isn't the case, it's just inherently expensive to have someone bring food to your door.

It makes no sense relative to what? Is the idea that that is simply too much to pay for the service of getting your food delivered, that it crosses some line of economic propriety?

Could it maybe be the case that this service was previously undervalued, or is that somehow out of the question?

If they can’t pay minimum wage, then maybe they don’t need to exist.

If someone doesn't like their employment situation, then maybe they should get a different job.