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2013年四级单项选择阅读理解附讲解

用考网【阅读理解】编辑：楚欣发布时间：2015-12-16 09:31:16

　　下面是学习啦小编整理的2013年四级单项选择阅读理解附讲解，希望对大家有帮助。

　　Peer-to-peer rental: The rise of the sharing economy

　　LAST night 40,000 people rented accommodation from a service that offers 250,000rooms in 30,000 cities in 192 countries. They chose their rooms and paid for everything online.But their beds were provided by private individuals, rather than a hotel chain. Hosts and guestswere matched up by Airbnb, a firm based in San Francisco. Since its launch in 2008 more than4m people have used it—2.5m of them in 2012 alone. It is the most prominent example of ahuge new “sharing economy”, in which people rent beds, cars, boats and other assets directlyfrom each other, co-ordinated via the internet.

　　You might think this is no different from running a bed-and-breakfast, owning a timeshareor participating in a car pool. But technology has reduced transaction costs, making sharingassets cheaper and easier than ever—and therefore possible on a much larger scale. The bigchange is the availability of more data about people and things, which allows physical assets tobe disaggregated and consumed as services. Before the internet, renting a surfboard, a powertool or a parking space from someone else was feasible, but was usually more trouble than itwas worth. Now websites such as Airbnb, RelayRides and SnapGoods match up owners andrenters; smartphones with GPS let people see where the nearest rentable car is parked; socialnetworks provide a way to check up on people and build trust; and online payment systemshandle the billing.

　　What’s mine is yours, for a fee

　　Just as peer-to-peer businesses like eBay allow anyone to become a retailer, sharing siteslet individuals act as an ad hoc taxi service, car-hire firm or boutique hotel as and when it suitsthem. Just go online or download an app. The model works for items that are expensive to buyand are widely owned by people who do not make full use of them. Bedrooms and cars are themost obvious examples, but you can also rent camping spaces in Sweden, fields in Australiaand washing machines in France. As proponents of the sharing economy like to put it, accesstrumps ownership.

　　Rachel Botsman, the author of a book on the subject, says the consumer peer-to-peerrental market alone is worth $26 billion. Broader definitions of the sharing economy includepeer-to-　　peer lending (though cash is hardly a spare fixed asset) or putting a solar panelon your roof and selling power back to the grid (though that looks a bit like becoming a utility).And it is not just individuals: the web makes it easier for companies to rent out spare officesand idle machines, too. But the core of the sharing economy is people renting things fromeach other.

　　Such “collaborative consumption” is a good thing for several reasons. Owners makemoney from underused assets. Airbnb says hosts in San Francisco who rent out their homesdo so for an average of 58 nights a year, making $9,300. Car owners who rent their vehicles toothers using RelayRides make an average of $250 a month; some make more than $1,000.Renters, meanwhile, pay less than they would if they bought the item themselves, or turned toa traditional provider such as a hotel or car-hire firm. (It is not surprising that many sharingfirms got going during the financial crisis.) And there are environmental benefits, too: renting acar when you need it, rather than owning one, means fewer cars are required and fewerresources must be devoted to making them.

　　For sociable souls, meeting new people by staying in their homes is part of the charm.Curmudgeons who imagine that every renter is Norman Bates can still stay at conventionalhotels. For others, the web fosters trust. As well as the background checks carried out byplatform owners, online reviews and ratings are usually posted by both parties to eachtransaction, which makes it easy to spot lousy drivers, bathrobe-pilferers and surfboard-wreckers. By using Facebook and other social networks, participants can check each other outand identify friends (or friends of friends) in common. An Airbnb user had her apartmenttrashed in 2011. But the remarkable thing is how well the system usually works.

　　Peering into the future

　　The sharing economy is a little like online shopping, which started in America 15 years ago.At first, people were worried about security. But having made a successful purchase from,say, Amazon, they felt safe buying elsewhere. Similarly, using Airbnb or a car-hire service forthe first time encourages people to try other offerings. Next, consider eBay. Having started outas a peer-to-peer marketplace, it is now dominated by professional “power sellers” (many ofwhom started out as ordinary eBay users). The same may happen with the sharing economy,which also provides new opportunities for enterprise. Some people have bought cars solely torent them out, for example.

　　Incumbents are getting involved too. Avis, a car-hire firm, has a share in a sharing rival. Sodo GM and Daimler, two carmakers. In future, companies may develop hybrid models, listingexcess capacity (whether vehicles, equipment or office space) on peer-to-peer rental sites. Inthe past, new ways of doing things online have not displaced the old ways entirely. But theyhave often changed them. Just as internet shopping forced Walmart and Tesco to adapt, soonline sharing will shake up transport, tourism, equipment-hire and more.

　　The main worry is regulatory uncertainty (see Technology Quarterly article). Will room-renters be subject to hotel taxes, for example? In Amsterdam officials are using Airbnb listingsto track down unlicensed hotels. In some American cities, peer-to-peer taxi services havebeen banned after lobbying by traditional taxi firms. The danger is that although some rulesneed to be updated to protect consumers from harm, incumbents will try to destroycompetition. People who rent out rooms should pay tax, of course, but they should not beregulated like a Ritz-Carlton hotel. The lighter rules that typically govern bed-and-breakfastsare more than adequate.

　　The sharing economy is the latest example of the internet’s value to consumers (see Freeexchange). This emerging model is now big and disruptive enough for regulators andcompanies to have woken up to it. That is a sign of its immense potential. It is time to startcaring about sharing.

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