Airbnb Works Perfectly, Until You Run Out of White People... New Study Confirms Black and Brown Communities Not Exactly Hotspots for Airbnb Rentals

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Western civilization works, until you run out of white people. 

Airbnb works perfectly, until you run out of white people in a community. [Airbnb provides bigger economic boost for white neighborhoods, study finds, Baltimore Sun, July 11, 2018]:

Airbnb rentals help local economies by driving restaurant traffic and employment in a handful of U.S. cities, but not in predominantly black or Hispanic neighborhoods, according to a study from Purdue University. 

New study confirms: civilization in the United States is thriving in communities free of black and brown people

The findings run counter to Airbnb’s longtime assertion that home hosting helps “diverse” neighborhoods by bringing tourists to areas of a city where hotels and other lodging options aren’t as plentiful. But Airbnb calls the study “deeply flawed.” 

Researchers at Purdue first examined a possible link between Airbnb and an improvement in local restaurants in New York City, the most-visited city in the U.S. They looked at data from Airbnb’s inception in 2008 through 2015 and found that if Airbnb activity, measured through Yelp visitor reviews of Airbnb stays, increases by 2 percent in a given neighborhood, restaurant employment there rises by about 3 percent. The study used government data for 2005-2015 to track employment numbers. 

The study was then expanded to observe trends in Chicago as well as Austin, Texas; Portland, Ore.; San Francisco; and Los Angeles. In Chicago, researchers found that Airbnb activity had a “positive, but not a statistically significant effect” on local restaurant employment, according to Mohammad Saifur Rahman of Purdue’s Krannert School of Management, one of the study’s authors. The impact was similar in San Francisco. 

And in Los Angeles, Airbnb activity did have a positive effect on restaurant hiring in predominately white and Hispanic neighborhoods, but not in predominantly black neighborhoods. The study found that the New York City trend held true in Austin and Portland. 

“I wish I could say that I was very surprised, but I was sadly not very surprised,” Rahman said of the discrepancies between neighborhoods. “We know that we have these tendencies.” 

In a statement, Airbnb took issue with the study’s methodology and underscored its belief that a rise in home-sharing hosts helps neighborhoods, no matter the racial makeup. 

“Using a subjective and voluntary input like Yelp reviews to draw conclusions in what purports to be a rigorous analysis is wrong and this study is deeply flawed,” spokesman Nick Papas said. 

In Chicago, Papas said, Airbnb guest counts surged 70 percent last year on the South Side. There are about 700 hosts on the South Side of Chicago, he said. The city had about 4,500 hosts citywide as of February. 

The fastest-growing areas in the city for Airbnb include Armour Square, North Lawndale, Bridgeport and Woodlawn, Papas said. Of those, only North Lawndale and Woodlawn are majority-black communities, and none has a Hispanic majority.

The free market in housing rentals once again helps illustrate why Jim Crow and restrictive covenants long ago existed: to protect white property owners from the consequences of Africans in America.