The Sharing Economy

Whether it's ridesharing with Uber, lending your power drill to a neighbor with Peerby, taking advantage of a home exchange with Airbnb, or dozens of other examples, the so-called "sharing economy" is firmly established in our daily life.
无论是通过Uber拼车，还是通过Peerby把电钻借给邻居，或者通过Airbnb进行家庭交换，或者其他几十种例子，这种所谓的“共享经济”已经牢固地扎根于我们的日常生活中。

While the concept has been in place for some time, numerous enterprising groups have found a way to make the most of the current economic environment.
虽然这个概念已经存在了一段时间，许多有进取心的团体已经找到了一种充分利用当前经济环境的方法。

Entrepreneur magazine explains:
企业家杂志解释说：

The idea behind the sharing economy isn’t new. Napster, eBay and Craigslist were all built on its basic tenets. But companies such as Uber and Airbnb have taken collaborative consumption to a new level. These pioneering companies created affordable solutions for cash-strapped consumers during the Great Recession, and they offered unique income streams for people who needed extra money or flexible work schedules.
共享经济背后的理念并不新鲜。Napster、eBay和Craigslist都是基于其基本原则构建的。但是像Uber和Airbnb这样的公司将协作消费提升到了一个新水平。这些开创性的公司在大衰退期间为资金紧张的消费者提供了负担得起的解决方案，并为需要额外收入或灵活工作时间的人们提供了独特的收入来源。

Generating revenues in the tens of billions of dollars globally, it’s difficult to ignore this growing segment of the economy. According to data from PricewaterhouseCoopers, we can quickly see that sharing is big business: Today, we estimate that the five main sharing economy sectors generate $15bn in global revenues, making up just 5% of total revenue generated by the ten sectors we looked at. However, by 2025, these same five sharing economy sectors could generate over half of overall sales in the ten sectors – a potential revenue opportunity worth $335bn.
全球范围内产生数百亿美元的收入，很难忽视这个不断增长的经济部分。根据普华永道的数据，我们可以很快看到共享是一个大生意：今天，我们估计五个主要的共享经济部门创造了150亿美元的全球收入，仅占我们调查的十个部门总收入的5%。然而，到2025年，这五个共享经济部门可能会占据十个部门总销售额的一半以上——这是一个价值3350亿美元的潜在收入机会。

Also referred to as the collaborative economy, gig economy, peer economy, or collaborative consumption, sharing.org defines the sharing economy as: A socio-economic ecosystem built around the sharing of human and physical resources. It includes the shared creation, production, distribution, trade and consumption of goods and services by different people and organizations.
共享经济也被称为协作经济、零工经济、对等经济或协作消费，共享.org将共享经济定义为：一个围绕人力和物质资源共享而构建的社会经济生态系统。它包括不同人群和组织对商品和服务的共同创造、生产、分配、交易和消费。

Call it what you will, there is a spectacular amount of growth taking place in the sharing sector. As TechCrunch reports, holiday-makers are making the change from big chain hotels, and looking for something a little more personal:
无论你怎么称呼，共享部门都在经历着惊人的增长。正如TechCrunch报道的那样，度假者正在从大型连锁酒店转向寻找一些更个性化的东西：

Growth is on the up and up for Airbnb. Nearly 17 million people worldwide booked their guest stays with the peer-to-peer lodging platform this summer, according to a new travel report. That’s a whopping 35,000% surge in the last five years – and a far cry from the three guests Airbnb hosted before officially launching in the summer of 2008.
Airbnb的增长正在不断上升。根据一份新的旅行报告，今年夏天，全球近1700万人通过这个对等住宿平台预订了住宿。这是过去五年中惊人的35000%的增长——与Airbnb在2008年夏天正式启动前接待的三位客人相去甚远。

If you’re in the market for someone to help you with your household chores, that’s not a problem either. After a large department store in Canada closed its doors in April, the newly laid off staff applied for odd jobs with AskforTasks. From the Globe and Mail:
如果你需要找人帮你做家务，那也不是问题。加拿大一家大型百货公司在四月份关闭后，新失业的员工申请了AskforTasks的零工。来自《环球邮报》：

Toronto startup AskforTasks, an online platform that allows individuals to sign up to do chores and other daily errands, has been seeing a 40-per-cent, month-over-month increase in “tasker” sign-up at a time when Canada is said to be in a mild recession. The platform saw a remarkable 800 percent increase in sign-ups after Target Canada closed all its stores early this year.
多伦多初创公司AskforTasks是一个在线平台，允许个人注册做家务和其他日常差事。在加拿大据说处于轻度衰退的时候，该平台的“任务者”注册量每月增长了40%。今年早些时候Target Canada关闭了所有商店后，平台的注册量惊人地增长了800%。

In China, the sharing economy has already gone far beyond car pooling and home rentals. As Sina.com notes, the sharing economy brings together excess capacity of products or services to "share" them:
在中国，共享经济已经远远超出了拼车和房屋租赁。正如新浪网指出的那样，共享经济将产品或服务的过剩产能聚集在一起进行“共享”：

Knowledge can be shared too. The Chinese website zaih.com, tries to connect people with expertise - whether in art, science or lifestyle - with people seeking advice. Those in need of professional help can click a button, schedule a face-to-face meeting with experts, and pay them a fee of about 50 U.S. dollars for a consultation.
知识也可以共享。中国网站zaih.com试图将拥有艺术、科学或生活方式方面专长的人与寻求建议的人联系起来。需要专业帮助的人可以点击一个按钮，安排与专家面对面的会议，并支付大约50美元的咨询费。

Stunning growth aside, some have voiced concerns over the way these ‘employees’ are being treated. Uber has for months been locked in court battles over the legality of their business practices. From the Huffington Post:
除了令人惊叹的增长，一些人对这些‘员工’的待遇提出了担忧。几个月来，Uber一直因其商业行为的合法性而陷入法庭争斗。来自《赫芬顿邮报》：

2015 has not been as kind to Uber and its brethren, as the fascination with a new business model has given way to serious concerns over everything from public safety to worker exploitation to unfair market monopolization. In some ways this is not surprising - the honeymoon for startups can be notoriously brief. While there are bound to be some growing pains, the sharing economy seems to have unlimited potential. With more minds working together, we can count on the right person with the necessary skills, networks, insights, and location to appear.
2015年对Uber及其同类公司并不友好，因为对新商业模式的迷恋已经让位于对公共安全、工人剥削和不公平市场垄断的严重关注。在某些方面，这并不令人意外——初创公司的蜜月期可能是出了名的短暂。虽然一定会有一些成长的痛苦，但共享经济似乎拥有无限的潜力。随着更多人共同努力，我们可以指望拥有必要技能、网络、洞察力和位置的合适人选出现。

As The Next Web concludes:
正如The Next Web总结的那样：

It’s clear that our current labor structure is in flux, and “going to work” no longer means driving to an office or a factory for a set amount of time. The traditional 40-hour workweek is experiencing an overhaul, and it will continue to evolve as new on-demand service platforms rise up to meet consumer demands.
很明显，我们目前的劳动力结构正在发生变化，“上班”不再意味着开车去办公室或工厂工作固定的时间。传统的40小时工作周正在经历一次大变革，并将随着新的按需服务平台的崛起继续演变以满足消费者需求。