Posted on 11/11/2019 6:09:23 AM PST by karpov
Are presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren and WeWork founder Adam Neumann the same person? I mean, they have different hairstyles and all, but their philosophies are more alike than not.
They both claim, falsely, to be capitalists. Ms. Warren told the New England Council last year, “I am a capitalist to my bones.” She then told CNBC, “I am a capitalist. Come on. I believe in markets.” It was almost as if she didn’t believe it herself. Then came the caveat: “But only fair markets, markets with rules. Markets without rules is about the rich take it all, it’s about the powerful get all of it. And that’s what’s gone wrong in America.” She clearly doesn’t understand capitalism.
Neither does Mr. Neumann, who said of WeWork, “We are making a capitalist kibbutz.” Talk about mixed metaphors. In Israel, a kibbutz is often defined as “a collective community, traditionally based in agriculture.” WeWork’s prospectus for its initial public offering mentioned the word “community” 150 times. Yet one little secret of kibbutzim is that many of them hired outsiders to do menial jobs that the “community” wouldn’t do, similar to migrant workers on U.S. farms. A capitalist kibbutz is a plain old farm, much like a WeWork building is plain old shared office space. Big deal.
Ms. Warren wants to reshape capitalism, while Mr. Neumann wants to “revolutionize your workspace.” Meanwhile, the Vision Fund, with capital from SoftBank and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, has thrown good money after bad, writing off $9.2 billion in its quest toward this WeWork revolution. The same mismatch between communitarian vision and market realities would doom Ms. Warren’s economic reshaping. It’s hard to repeal good old capitalism.
The commonalities go on. Last year, Ms. Warren proposed the Accountable Capitalism Act.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
WHEW!
The crazy is strong with this one...
lol, WeWork spaces are very nice.
But...they are just nice shared office spaces. An old-fashioned real estate play.
That they have kombucha in the fridge, decent coffee, some open seating and you check in on an iPad, doesn’t make them a “high tech” start up.
This article is good and it shows that poetry doesn’t belong in an IPO prospectus. (I love poetry....just not...there).
Oh so that’s what WeWork is all about. I delivered a few packages to them and no one could explain to me what they did.
Tfgu
Wework is to office space, what flop houses and sleeping rooms are to rental properties...
lol.....there’s an element of truth in that....
imagine a competitor getting the word out:
WeWork is just a flop house with kombucha......
Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against shared office spaces... but its hardly a “revolutionary” concept, and its been laughable from day one that fools were throwing the kind of money they were at it...
It is literally applying the sleeping room/flop house concept to office space, and its nothing really new.
Flailing Arms Fraud, LieAwatha. What was your first clue this criminal would not be good for the republic in any governing capacity.
DISMANTLE CFPB
Exactly!
Just a variation on an old-fashioned real estate play.
That’s what the tech generation, divorced from history, and non-conversant with basic business ideas, gets wrong. They think that everything they come up with is revolutionary and high tech....and it isn’t. WeWork is simply shared office space. Shared office space that is nice, with some amenities.
But WeWork ain’t Google.... lol
It sort of reminds me of FitBit. A very good basic product that fitness people like. A lot.
But it ain’t gonna compete with Apple. Or improve the health of the entire world (one of the taglines they used over the years).
Not everyone can be a visionary.
And WeWork ain’t visionary.
Sounds more like WeeWork to me.
Make them all ‘punch in’ in the morning, and ‘punch out’ when they leave - and have the times published online in real-time everyday.
Publish their daily schedules online, so we know what they're doing.
Have them submit receipts for everything they are charging to the government, and make them all fly coach. Further, no Acela for Amtrak riders. Coach on the train as well.
If they want to be good Comrades, then they should walk the walk they would have other citizens walk.
PoncaHonkey is the 19th Amendment personified.
“lol, WeWork spaces are very nice.”
These fraudsters have been on credit hold at my company for over a year.
L
gosh I’m sorry to hear that....
Well the crazy thing was the cash being pumped into it.... Shared Office Space is NOTHING new, and it sure isn’t “DISRUPTIVE”... been around for decades... in fact, every office complex that has space it has difficulty getting rented, tends to fill it with this sort of things...
Its an insanely low barrier, relatively low cost, simple way to get cashflow from vacant space.
Its unfathomable that investors pumped the kind of cash they did at this idea, and let alone throw more good money after bad, once the wheels finally came off when it was revealed as the snake oil it always was... Softbank, or whoever it was, should see their CEO immediately removed after making that play.
Most of the new “tech” stuff is not “visionary” at all.. its low hanging fruit.... Uber/WeWork/etc they are all low hanging fruit... not revolutionary... and most are not even remotely financially sustainable. Uber can only hope to see positive cash if the automated car arrives, which is decades away, and once it exists, their entire business is commoditized... as anyone can fire up a fleet of them, and a request app together quickly.. so the first mover advantage really holds no benefit long term,..... other than if they happen to get some very profitable patents for self driving... The model itself is not ever cashflow positive with humans in the equation and once you remove them, your entire model is a commodity.
But they burn BILLIONS per quarter, and fools keep throwing money at it.....
excellent post
uber can only compete with the competitors entering the market (speaking at this phase, before self driving) on price and service....
to your point, the economic law that margin will continue to erode is even more relevant, because the barrier to entry is very low.
uber only has first mover advantage (which will diminish with margins). perhaps it has a “labor supply” advantage if they take care of drivers (I think they are doing well there for now). but the more you take care of your labor supply, the more your costs go up.....which leads back to the first point.
uber is simply a super efficient taxi.
and taxis are NOT disruptive.
theyve been around forever.......
Like most politicians, especially democRATS, she says one thing but does or is for, another thing.
Wall Street is not fooled by this sleight of hand in the slightest.
Its a greater fool proposition IMHO.. but the folks who got in can now cash in their still grossly overvalued stock and become billionaires.... like the one guy just did... cashed out over 1/2 a billion in stock, while the company keeps losing money...
And the WeWork CEO who lied, cheated and stole got a buyout of over a Billion to go away as softbank stupidly thought there was still some sort of spit shine left for them to find on that turd.
“Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against shared office spaces...”
Can’t you just go to the local library or Starbucks and have essentially the same thing - for free. And have more than just kombucha.
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