The problem for restaurant-employed delivery staff is nearly the same as the customer-employed delivery staff mentioned above.
And yet somehow we had restaurant delivery for 50 years before the invention of the cell phone. And grocery delivery for a hundred years before that.
Both pizza joints, and the Chinese place I order from employ their own people.
The only thing that's changed is that a certain cohort of people are terrified to pick up a phone and speak to another human being, and so delegate that most basic of human functions to a computer program.
The only actual utility of these apps is the ability to track and obsess over the precise location of my food, as if I'm going to die of starvation if I don't know exactly where it is.
Both pizza joints, and the Chinese place I order from employ their own people.
This is the crux of the matter. We're not living in the "2 pizza joints and a Chinese place" world anymore. In my city there are hundreds of restaurants serving cuisines from half the countries on the planet. Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, British, Nigerian, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Mexican, Salvadoran, Peruvian, Brazilian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese (including Cantonese, Sichuanese, Shanghainese, Taiwanese, and Hakka), Indian (too many to count, likely from every province in the country), Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Thai, Vietnamese, ...
We also have movie theatres selling popcorn, Dairy Queen selling Blizzards, StarBucks selling frappuccinos, and McDonald's selling McFlurries, doughnut shops selling Boston creams, dessert shops selling matcha roll cakes, ... I didn't even mention pizza joints!
In other words, the delivery apps bring customers an explosion of options they never had before. That is their highest utility for customers (while offering the risk pool solution to restaurants).
In my city there are hundreds of restaurants serving cuisines from half the countries on the planet. Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, British, Nigerian, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Mexican, Salvadoran, Peruvian, Brazilian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese (including Cantonese, Sichuanese, Shanghainese, Taiwanese, and Hakka), Indian (too many to count, likely from every province in the country), Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Thai, Vietnamese, ...
In my city, too. But I don't presume that I have the right to have every single cuisine that exists delivered to me at near-zero cost. Sometimes you have to make an effort in life.
What do rights have to do with it? We’re talking about supply and demand. There is supply, there is demand, and the delivery apps provide the logistics to connect the two.
If we go back to the way things were 30 years ago then we have fewer restaurants, less economic activity, less diversity, and a less interesting life for everyone!
No, we don't. People still have to eat. If anything, we have fewer restaurants today because of consolidation in the industry and the way massive-scale delivery enables ghost kitchens that take customers away from actual restaurants.
less economic activity
Uber Eats barely generates any "economic activity." It doesn't rate against the economic activity generated when people go outside.
less diversity
Now you're just making things up. People don't become Ethiopian because they sat on their couch to eat at Ethiopian delivery compared with actually going to an Ethiopian restaurant.
a less interesting life for everyone!
Leaving your house is more interesting than being inside. It's pretty much the definition of "living."
It’s -15 C outside here and the snow is blowing sideways. NO ONE is going outside to grab lunch. They’re all ordering Uber Eats. If Uber Eats didn’t exist they’d be eating egg salad sandwiches for lunch, not ordering a pizza from a place that pays a full time driver.
Sure someone is. The Uber Eats guy. Because of you. Not considering other people to be equal human beings is the root of the problem.
Part of being an adult is to be prepared. Surely you knew it was going to be -15 more than an hour before you got hungry. You DO have a smart phone, after all. It comes with a weather app built in.
What do you think people did before we had smartphones? They didn't sit around and whine about the temperature and not eat lunch. They bought stuff ahead of time, including egg salad sandwiches.
Oh, the horror of having to pack a lunch like a caveman, and not a self-entitled knowledge worker!
I hope you somehow manage to recover. Perhaps clutching your emotional support water bottle will help.
And for that I am happy with simple web site. List of options I can have, basic modifications like remove or add. Some extras, and option to pay there and then.
Not only do a few of my local restaurants employ their own drivers, but they also use websites to allow for online ordering so I do not have to pick up the phone anyway.
And yet somehow we had restaurant delivery for 50 years before the invention of the cell phone. And grocery delivery for a hundred years before that.
Both pizza joints, and the Chinese place I order from employ their own people.
The only thing that's changed is that a certain cohort of people are terrified to pick up a phone and speak to another human being, and so delegate that most basic of human functions to a computer program.
The only actual utility of these apps is the ability to track and obsess over the precise location of my food, as if I'm going to die of starvation if I don't know exactly where it is.