January 21, 2016
WASHINGTON — Chris Lehane, Airbnb’s head of global policy, will appear Thursday before hundreds of American mayors with an enticing pitch: team up with us to collect millions of dollars in taxes for you. On Wednesday, the head of the hotel industry’s lobbying group spoke to the same audience with a very different message: Airbnb isn’t a good partner; it is breaking your city laws. Katherine Lugar, president of the hotel association, on Wednesday presented a study her own group had commissioned. It said that an estimated $500 million in revenue was collected by Airbnb hosts, who the hotel group described as essentially professional landlords renting out rooms full-time, a violation of many local laws….
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/22/technology/airbnb-takes-its-case-to-us-mayors-conference.html?_r=1
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