Surely, as people who favor good governance rather than just arbitrary governance, we can all favor eliminating those costly and pointless regulations now? Or do we just favor arbitrary regulations just because we like regulations?
The regulatory model around hotels is good governance.
Fire safety is the most obvious example. A modern hotel is engineered to slow down the spread of fire and preserve life. Sprinklers, fire resistant doors and walls, etc.
Airbnb is an awesome thing when it does what it initially did -- handle house rentals. When that business model failed to provide growth, they pivoted to the current model where they've become the eBay of real estate by turning a blind eye to obvious fraud and abuse.
If you legally convert your property to a hotel, that use change triggers a need to become code compliant.
Also, accidents are more likely to happen with short term rentals. People tend to take care of their stuff better than someone else's.
That's what the law currently says. Since you are so worried that people might burn to death, why shouldn't we change this law?
If not, why not?
It's called building codes. We don't allow balloon frame houses anymore, for example.
With commercial property rules can be applied differently. Airbnb just dumps responsibility on others.
Unfortunately that means if you're in a wheelchair, are a victim of a crime due to lax judgement/practice by the property owner, or die in a fire because there's no lit sign pointing to the stairs, you as a "guest" and the "host" are fucked.