Post takes days, weeks, even months. Food delivery is minutes, and point-to-point.
And yet you still keep ordering.
One of these is a government service and subsidized.
Government vs private.
It’s the same with healthcare believe it or not.
USPS is the most underappreciated thing in the world. In the shittiest areas I’ve ever lived it’s still been fairly reliable. In a nice area, forget about it, perfect.
Sometimes, people really want their taco order to ride on its own private taxi.
the economic ignorance in this thread is astounding
If most of that went to the driver I would be OK with it. I never use those services, they exploit workers
I only do when my daughter is staying somewhere and doesn’t have food to eat. That’s rare, but it has happened a few times.
Today we are learning about economies of scale, kids!
See the giant bag? He’s got multiple orders in it.
Not as efficient as driving to every mailbox in a row, to be sure.
But it also doesn’t cost Uber probably more than 25% of what they charge for an order, to pay the delivery driver.
A lot of it is about latency too. You’re paying to have someone go get it right now and take it to you right now. Post services pick up stuff daily and get it there over the course of a week or so depending on where exactly it’s going. If you were paying someone to come to you, pick it up, drive it straight to where it’s going, well, it’d be faster, but cost a ton more.
This is a perfect illustration of why we should not privatize essential services.
“Essential” is your criteria? To be clear, you’re saying that anything that’s an actual human need, should be state run?
The mail is, yes.
Thankfully food delivery isn’t essential, therefore it should be privatized (preferably by a restaurant that delivers to places hundreds of miles away by plane)
We probably shouldn’t, but this is a terrible example why.
Look at that money on the table! Of course we should privatize the USPS!
(/s of course)
I think that if food delivery was treated how my last postal package was treated, then all food would be arriving as a soup, or maybe as a goulash.
I figured out how to get my food with NO delivery fee: I get off my fat ass and get it myself. Novel approach, I know.
I’m happy that you are physically able, that you have places within walking distance to pick the food up from, or if not that you own a vehicle and are not vision impaired or afflicted with some other ailment that would make driving impossible. I hope you reflect on how fortunate you are.
I do, all the time.
My point was that most people are able to procure their own food without paying exorbitant fees for it; in their case, I consider it lazy and wasteful. That’s also my opinion, and people are free to apply their own judgement.
It was a completely reasonable take and everyone understood what you meant.
Only on lemmy would someone try to paint an exploitative middleman like UberEats as a noble service for those unable to journey to the store.
There are actually services that do that and they don’t charge a 30% markup. That actually seems even more exploitative and you’d think the other commenter would be enraged at Uber.
Such is the price for a popular top-level comment. I suffer so that those who must always be the contrarian can satisfy their unrelenting urges. Today, it is my internet cross to bear.
How exactly did I attempt to paint Uber Eats (who is absolutely an exploitative middleperson) as a “noble service?”
I’m happy that you are physically able, that you have places within walking distance to pick the food up from, or if not that you own a vehicle and are not vision impaired or afflicted with some other ailment that would make driving impossible
The implication being that thankfully for UberEats people who aren’t physically able, don’t have places within walking distance, don’t own a vehicle, or are vision impaired or afflicted with some other ailment that makes driving impossible, they can get their food delivered.
UberEats is a cancer and honestly, everyone I’ve known who’s disabled or on a fixed income in some way couldn’t afford the insane markup.
That’s not at all what I implied or meant but thank you for assuming I’m the worst person ever for pushing back against someone being proud they can just get off their ass and pick up food.
Yes, Uber Eats is a cancer but I’ve known people to count down to the cents so their account won’t be overdrawn so that they can order one hot meal delivered. Yes I absolutely think it is in the monetization plans of all the delivery apps to take advantage of people in that situation, I was just trying to point out “get off your ass and pick it up” isn’t a viable option for everyone. Also, not everyone is the best at math or managing their money.
Jesus christ. When you piss does it come out like a corkscrew?
Me who is physically disabled and can’t leave my house: 👁️👄👁️
And sometimes you’re too tired for that or want something you can’t reasonably make at home. There’s nothing wrong with ordering food.
Nothing wrong with it rarely or if you’re disabled, but paying $30 for McDonald’s or whatever on a regular basis is insane
There’s zero indication that OP is ordering delivery often, so I’m not sure why you have jumped to that conclusion?
Besides, whether or not ordering delivery often depends on what you’re ordering and on your disposable income. McDonald’s is far from the only option, plenty of real restaurants offer delivery too these days. If you can afford it, you can probably eat a fairly healthy diet even if you never cook. Not for me, in no small part because I usually enjoy cooking, but I’m not gonna judge people who don’t. Doesn’t affect me, I’m not gonna go out of my way to be annoyed.
My post was in no way attacking OP. I was just soapboxing about food delivery services that charge insane fees for something which, in my opinion, is mostly useless.
I fully admit I’m being judgmental. And people are free to disagree with me.
Removed by mod
So I don’t really understand why you are paying so much for food? Looking at the local delivery app, I just now chose a “big Mac mcmenue” containing a big Mac, fries and a 0.5l drink. This would cost me 10,89€, let’s say 13€ with a very generous tip.
At this moment it seems 13€ are worth $13,48. What are you ordering that costs more than double of that?
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Almost everyone on uber eats (and similar services) mark up their items. This sausage burrito meal is $10 on uber eats and is 8 something in store
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Delivery fee 5.99
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tip (whatever you want to pay)
For a normal meal this will more than double the price. Order just about anything else and you’re easily at $30 with still almost half the price being the delivery.
That’s crazy
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Not everyone is ordering for a single person.
“Nothing wrong with ordering food” - correct
But there is something wrong with paying double to have it delivered - it’s called wasting money. Do y’all have a lot of money to waste?
How would they complain that everything is way too expensive nowadays if they didn’t?
there’s nothing wrong with it but it’s a luxury service so you shouldn’t complain about it being expensive
Novel approach, I know.
In digest form, I presume?
It is not that easy for everyone. I for example can’t afford a car. And restaurants aren’t exactly around the corner. So if i want to get food like that, i have to have it delivered.
What about public transport?
5 euros is cheaper for delivery than 15 for a train ticket. Its not that big of a deal honestly. I don’t know the pricing in america but its not to bad where i live. The food itself is becoming way to expensive though.
I only order food a few times a year so its no problem.
It’s significantly different in America. I think doordash has different payment structures in Europe bcos of laws whereas, in most of America, drivers are paid next to nothing. It’s like tipping culture with American service workers, except way worse.
So like, inflated prices (set by the restaurant and optional, but often done to make up for doordash’s cut) + delivery fee (pocketed by doordash of course!) + ridiculous tip bcos now I gotta pay this driver’s livable wage.
Door dash really is an unsustainable business. It’s probably gonna tank in the next 5 years, I’d bet.
How about, you know, a grocery store?
Genius! Never thought about that!.. I order food maybe 2-3 times a year. What makes you think i exclusively order food?
If I’m bothering to go out anyway I’ll just get ingredients from the store and do it myself.
From one extreme to the next. Interesting.
That’s just for cases where I’m bothering to go grocery shopping anyway. Sometimes I’m just too tired or lazy and then I’m ordering food.
An even better idea.
I feel so too, you get more for the same money. But getting stuff delivered has its place in situations where you for some reason don’t have the energy.
USPS should not focus on profitability and fuck Uber and the gig economy.
yes! it is a SERVICE Americans already pay for in taxes, the need to make a profit on it makes no sense.
No we don’t. The USPS is not tax funded, it is self funded by shipping costs and stamp sales.
I have been bamboozled, swore it was
Even worse, it was made “unprofitable” by being required to have a ridiculously high standard of pension coverage, which I believe just ended or ends soon.
Now they will swing hard in the other direction. Heaven forbid you have TOO MUCH pension coverage as inflation spikes.
wow… no wonder we will never get free healthcare in this country
Things are fucked from the top down. It’s by design, It’s a long listen but worth checking out How Conservatism Won by Robert Evans. He lays out in a clear concise way “how a consortium of rich failsons got together to fund a network of right wing think tanks and shift American culture in a fun new direction. (note: it was not actually fun at all).” They’ve been very successful and those think tanks are now pipelines used to funnel ideological purists into powerful positions like our current Supreme Court.
It’s not even a conspiracy, it’s all easily verifiable. These people do not share our American values. They do not value freedoms (speech, press, religion, etc) the same way that many of us do. They want a return to the gilded age with them as the robber barons and landed gentry and everyone else as a permanent, toiling underclass.
I’d be very fine with it being tax funded instead of being funded by stamps and parcel metering. We might have much less shit mail as a result. It was an actual part of this government, not a corporation like now, before 1970, when the Reorg Act went into effect. Look before 1970 then USPS workers were not allowed to collectively bargain but that still could have been achieved with the a different outcome in 1970.
I would be very fine with tax funding because as a service the work they do facilitates other sectors’ viabilities. There might also be more accountability to help the workers.
