Racial and Gender Discrimination in Transportation Network Companies

49 Pages Posted: 31 Oct 2016 Last revised: 27 Mar 2022

See all articles by Yanbo Ge

Yanbo Ge

University of Washington - Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Christopher R. Knittel

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research (CEEPR); National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

Don MacKenzie

University of Washington - Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Stephen Zoepf

Stanford University

Date Written: October 2016

Abstract

Passengers have faced a history of discrimination in transportation systems. Peer transportation companies such as Uber and Lyft present the opportunity to rectify long-standing discrimination or worsen it. We sent passengers in Seattle, WA and Boston, MA to hail nearly 1,500 rides on controlled routes and recorded key performance metrics. Results indicated a pattern of discrimination, which we observed in Seattle through longer waiting times for African American passengers—as much as a 35 percent increase. In Boston, we observed discrimination by Uber drivers via more frequent cancellations against passengers when they used African American-sounding names. Across all trips, the cancellation rate for African American sounding names was more than twice as frequent compared to white sounding names. Male passengers requesting a ride in low-density areas were more than three times as likely to have their trip canceled when they used a African American-sounding name than when they used a white-sounding name. We also find evidence that drivers took female passengers for longer, more expensive, rides in Boston. We observe that removing names from trip booking may alleviate the immediate problem but could introduce other pathways for unequal treatment of passengers.

Suggested Citation

Ge, Yanbo and Knittel, Christopher R. and MacKenzie, Don and Zoepf, Stephen, Racial and Gender Discrimination in Transportation Network Companies (October 2016). NBER Working Paper No. w22776, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2861708

Yanbo Ge (Contact Author)

University of Washington - Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering ( email )

201 More Hall
Seattle, WA 98195-2700
United States

Christopher R. Knittel

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research (CEEPR) ( email )

One Amherst Street, E40-279
Cambridge, MA 02142
United States

National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

1050 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02138
United States

Don MacKenzie

University of Washington - Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering ( email )

201 More Hall
Seattle, WA 98195-2700
United States

Stephen Zoepf

Stanford University ( email )

Stanford, CA 94305
United States

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