Sharing economy: Why we will barely own anything in the future / news.com.au, ABC Far North
reprinted from 
Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier Mail, NT Times, New Zealand Herald, Adelaide Now, Balonne Beacon, Queensland Times,
a list of Australia’s beet sharing sites are at the bottom of this story.
IN 2030, if we need a ball gown, a grandparent to babysit our kids or a screwdriver to repair damage at home, we’ll simply go online, pay a small fee and borrow one.
Most of us won’t own cars, holiday homes or work at the same office everyday. Our houses won’t be filled with stuff we rarely use.
Many of our daily functions will be outsourced for a small fee, with all these interactions controlled through our smartphones.
These are the predictions of business futurist Morris Miselowski, who argues the sharing economy will soon facilitate most of our daily interactions.
“We used to amass things just in case, but we don’t have to anymore, because we can find the things we need when we need them quite easily and comfortably, through the sharing economy,” Mr Miselowski told news.com.au.
“It’s become difficult for many people to own an asset or aspire to own an asset. They just can’t afford it,” Mr Miselowski said.
“A lawnmower, the holiday home, the car … we won’t have to buy these things. We’ll just rent them and then we can still have the experience.”
It doesn’t make financial sense to own a bunch of things that you rarely used, says Steve Orenstein, CEO of Share Hub, a start-up accelerator for Australian sharing economy businesses. Some of its members include Airtasker, storage marketplace Spacer, car sharing service Car Next Door, pet-sitting service Mad Paws and Camplify, a caravan-sharing community.
“It doesn’t make sense to own these really large assets anymore and our platforms are making these really accessible to Australian consumers,” Mr Orenstein told news.com.au
“From a cost effective point of view and a flexibility point of view, you’re helping people make smart use of their money and using things only when you actually need them,” Mr Orenstein said.
Here’s a list of some the ways the sharing economy will soon be involved in our lives.
DELIVERY: “The supermarkets and the arrival of Amazon will bring mass delivery everywhere. But people will also be looking for short term, swift deliveries,” Mr Miselowski said.
“People who have a spare back seat or boot will pick up goods and services for people and deliver them. It could be groceries, it could be anything.”
STORAGE: “Services like Spacer let people who have a garage, or an extra car spot, or even a cupboard, rent it out,” Mr Miselowski said
“The biggest storage company in 10 years time won’t be the traditional storage company. They’re too far away for most people. Imagine being able to store your stuff at your neighbour’s place?”
ADVERTISING: “People are willing to have their car wrapped with advertising for a fee. That will soon become the norm,” he said.
MONEY: “People are doing away with the usual money players like the banks, and lending money peer-to-peer will soon become the norm,” he said.
COOKING: “There are lots of people who will come and cook for you at their home or yours,” Mr Miselowski said.
“Food delivery services are skyrocketing and there is already an app for people to connect with home cooks in their neighbourhood.”
CLOTHES: “There are already lots of sites where you can hire special occasion wear, and this will soon expand to other parts of the wardrobe,” he said.
WORKING: “Full time work will turn into task-based work. We are seeing a fundamental shift in business. Part time work was always seen as a negative thing, because it was what you did when you couldn’t get full time work. But now many people make a living out of it,” Mr Miselowski said
“So when those people are doing these tasks, someone will say ‘I have an office with an extra desk available’ and they’ll rent out that desk, not dissimilar to how hairdressers rent out any extra chairs they have.”
TOOLS: “When you need a hammer or a screwdriver, you can just find a neighbour that you can rent one from, instead of keeping an entire full toolkit in your garage, that only gets used a few times a year,” Mr Miselowski said
GRANDPARENTS: “This is a quirky one, but families who don’t have that extra support or a grandparent, can hire one. It fosters social connectedness and provides that much needed support for families,” Mr Miselowski said.
for a list of some of Australia’s best sharing economy sites click here
and listen to Morris’s chat with ABC Far North’s Phil Staley on the Sharing Economy, recorded live on Monday 25th September (11 mins 32 secs:):
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What is the sharing economy, and how significant is it?
The sharing economy is the shift from owning assets to accessing services — Uber over car ownership, Airbnb over hotels, streaming over collections. It is significant because it changes the economics of many industries fundamentally, redistributing value from asset owners to platform operators and, unevenly, to service providers.
Q: What are the Ripple Effects™ of the sharing economy?
Second-order effects include the casualisation of labour in sectors previously dominated by employment relationships, the disruption of insurance and regulatory frameworks built around ownership, and the concentration of market power in platform operators who own very few physical assets but control enormous economic activity.
Q: Where is the sharing economy model reaching its limits?
In sectors where the quality, reliability, and safety of service cannot be adequately delivered through a gig workforce. Healthcare, aged care, and complex professional services require continuity and accountability that transactional sharing economy structures struggle to provide.
Q: Can Morris Misel speak about the sharing economy and platform business models?
Yes. For keynotes on platform economics and the future of ownership, visit morrismisel.com/event-organisers.
reprinted from Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier Mail, NT Times, New Zealand Herald, Adelaide Now, Balonne Beacon, Queensland Times, a list of Australia’s beet sharing sites are at the bottom of this story. IN 2030, if we need a ball gown, a grandparent to babysit our kids or .
The window between a signal arriving and it demanding a response is shortening. Sharing economy is already shaping strategy conversations in forward-looking organisations. Treating it as a future concern rather than a present one builds a preparedness gap that will have to be closed under pressure.
The most important question is not whether Sharing economy will matter, but how quickly it will matter in your specific context. Leaders benefit most from mapping the ripple effects early — not just the direct impact but the second and third-order consequences that arrive later and hit harder. That is the practical work of foresight.
