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Comment by Eridrus | Hacker News Reader

A substantial amount of NYC apartment buildings still have doormen, people claim to like it. I do not place enough value on a doorman that I would want to live in one where I need to pay for what can be done by an intercom.

Which is to say, it is sometimes a fallacy, but often, it is not. We have far more intercoms and automatic door openers than doormen.

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> what can be done by an intercom

The Doorman Fallacy is exactly this—thinking that one function of a job is the whole job. The doorman doesn't just open doors nor relay messages. They're eyes and ears, security, friendliness, an extra hand with bags, local knowledge, emergency response... The list goes on and on. Almost none of their functions can be replaced with an intercom.

The modern alternative is elevators where you can't push buttons but just wave a card at it, which themselves mean obnoxious tech systems to deal with delivery people and packages and visitors, and other automation that seems to border on the paranoid. Which—just by its existence vs a human—further removes you from society and day-to-day practice at normal human interaction.

Much of the US has buildings that are too small to justify a doorman regardless, but something is lost for it.

"Individuals aren't naturally paid-up members of the human race, except biologically. They need to be bounced around by the Brownian motion of society, which is a mechanism by which human beings constantly remind one another that they are...well...human beings." - Terry Pratchett

Yes, yes, yes, people say all this. And yet, doormen in apartment buildings are a dying breed because their main function has been replaced.

Whether or not we find a doorman worth the cost is a separate issue from the reduction of a job to one of its functions. The Doorman Fallacy fan be completely true and we can decide that they are not worth their cost. It's not the same question.

The "Doorman fallacy" is an argument that replacing them is impossible because of all the other things they do. The fact that the other things are not as valuable indicates that while they do a bunch of other things, the main thing is the main value they provide in most cases.

There will be cases where they stick around (luxury hotels, etc) where the ancillary benefits are the point, but there are many cases where the primary task is the economically valuable thing.

> The "Doorman fallacy" is an argument that replacing them is impossible because of all the other things they do.

Respectfully, it is not.

It seems like you're breezing past the concept of the fallacy entirely.

The value of the doorman isn't the intercom functionality.

People like doorman buildings because the building has a real person with eyes on the premises at all times.

An intercom or automatic door opening system can't deal with delivery people who can't figure out the intercom system, don't follow delivery instructions, leave your package/food somewhere random, etc. And that's only a fraction of the value a doorman provides.

An intercom system won't deter trespassers, petty crime, etc.

As long as the building is large enough, the cost is negligible.

I randomly picked a listing in NYC, 219 East 69th Street. 145 apartments on 13 floors.

Let's say you're paying a doorman 24/7 at $30/hour, that's $150/month/resident.

> $150/month/resident

Was this supposed to be negligible?

Google AI suggests the rents there run from $5k to $9k a month, so, is 1.7% to 3% of the rent negligible?

I pay this much for a trash collection service that doesn't seem to ever show up and fines me if I get the unlisted rules wrong.

The unit I was looking at was listed $6k a month, so that’s about right.

Compared to many condo fees that is tiny, yes

Maybe negligible was a strong word but I’ll say “a good value” instead.

The building I randomly picked out wasn’t particularly large, either. The larger the building, the smaller this cost becomes.

I know someone living in a 900 unit tower. A doorman is an obvious benefit in that building.

Welcome to new york

I’ve lived in NYC buildings with doormen and without. Making friends with them is key. They are very helpful to the residents that treat them with respect.

But if you never bother talking to the person at the door then you won’t see much value and thus an intercom seems just fine.

I’d choose the building with rather than without.

$150 a month for someone competent and engaged, who knows most residents by face, when I need a hand or a cargo elevator unlocked for 5 min it can “just” happen, security for loved ones or children onsite, a human interface to kickoff interactions with the apartment admin staff if needed, and all around helpful guy? 100% worth the extra 150.

Hell the smoother interface and interaction model with the apartment admin alone is worth it.

150 a month isn’t negligible at all. Maybe upper east side that’s fine

I am breezing past it because it is wrong. You can observe this by the fact that most buildings do not have them. They are, at this point, an NYC luxury oddity.

I live in an apartment without one and I would not pay $150/month for a dedicated doorman so that delivery people have an easier time with the intercom.

And honestly, you are undercounting the cost, you can't get away with 3 doormen for 24/7 coverage and the salary is not the all in cost. It's probably closer the $300/month for 145 apartments.

If you're already paying $10k/month for an apartment, sure, you don't care about the cost and are happy with the fringe benefits. This doesn't change the fact that the vast majority of people have an intercom because the main function is solved.

Doormen are awesome.

First they provide real security an intercom does not. They know everyone and won't let an unknown go through the door without checking in.

The courier leave their wares to them, and can hand over packages for the courier.

There's no extra cost, really, to having them do dry cleaning since all they do is hand over all the dry cleaning to a service that comes by.

There’s probably some double fallacy here, like “x is valuable in this specific situation so it must be valuable in all situations” - I think that’s actually a named fallacy but anyway.

I’m sure it’s similarly true for travel agents, real estate agents, probably lawyers, etc. Just because there are circumstances when someone values them doesn’t automatically justify them everywhere or refute that many of them basically don’t do anything.

The point of the fallacy is that you don't know what value they bring or when they bring it.

Real estate agents are a good example. They might be the only people involved aware of the processes everyone's engaged in and moving things forward. Having helped build tools for a local shop I can tell you that their checklists and flowcharts can't and won't be built with AI because hoarding and sharing information has always been part of their competitive advantage.

A corollary might be that the value of human involvement is unknowable because human beings aren't rational. The Doorman is a buffer against chaos.

The total failure of PurpleBricks attempt to disrupt estate agents in the UK is a good example of this. Turns out people had no idea of the shit-shovelling, chivvying and smoothing-over agents do to help sales actually close.

Were those the guys trying to remove roadblocks set up specifically for people who’d like to encourage sprawl?

Currently in NYC trying to pick up a key my friend left with their doorman to feed their cat. Been waiting 20m and they are nowhere to be found :(

Well, they are human beings who do sometimes need to take bathroom breaks.

Did you get the key?

We have to know how long it took.

55m! Apparently there was an emergency in another part of the building.

I guess the main reason to have a doorman these days is for security and handling of mail/packages. Packages left unattended in a busy street of NYC would probably be almost instantly stolen.

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