Study finds Boston Uber drivers twice as likely to cancel rides for people with black-sounding names
The study also found women were taken on longer, more expensive rides.
A new study by researchers from MIT, Stanford, and the University of Washington found a pattern of discrimination by Uber drivers against black and female passengers in Boston.
According to the results of the study—conducted from November 2015 to March 2016 over 911 total trips and released Monday by the National Bureau of Economic Research—Uber drivers in Boston were twice as likely to cancel rides for passengers with black-sounding names, compared to those using white-sounding names (10.1 percent versus 4.9 percent).
The difference was even more striking among men in low population density areas, where those with a black-sounding name experienced triple the cancellation rate by drivers compared to men with white-sounding names.
To carry out the experiment, researchers had students request rides in the Boston area using stereotypically black-sounding and white-sounding pseudonyms (examples from the study: Aisha versus Allison, or Kareem versus Greg).
The study did not find the same sweeping pattern of discrimination among Lyft drivers.
Researchers theorized that because Uber drivers see a passenger’s name and photo only after accepting a trip, they discriminate by canceling, whereas Lyft drivers, who see the passenger’s name before, may simply not accept the trip.
Female passengers were also being taken for a ride by their Uber drivers, in more than one sense.
According to the study, women in Boston were taken on longer, more expensive rides compared to their male counterparts taking similar routes.
Researchers wrote that the difference in treatment based on gender was also backed up by “anecdotal evidence” by female passengers:
Some excessive fares were the result of drivers who started the trip before picking up the passenger or ended the trip after dropping off the female passenger. Other female riders reported “chatty” drivers who drove extremely long routes, on some occasions even driving through the same intersection multiple times. As a result, the additional travel that female riders are exposed to appears to be a combination of profiteering and flirting to a captive audience.
Researchers conducted a similar, though less narrowly focused, study in Seattle, where they found as much as a 35 percent increase in wait times for black passengers across all ride-hail companies.
“In many ways, the sharing economy is making it up as they go along,” said Christopher Knittel, an MIT professor and an author of the study told Bloomberg. “A lot of this is a learning process, and you can’t expect these companies to have everything perfect right out of the gate.”
Rachel Holt, Uber’s head of North American operations, told Bloomberg that ride sharing apps were closing an unequal transportation status quo and said discrimination had “no place” at the company.
“We believe Uber is helping reduce transportation inequities across the board, but studies like this one are helpful in thinking about how we can do even more,” Holt said in an email.
In conclusion to the study, researcher suggested one solution for racial discrimination could be anonymity for passengers and drivers in ride-hailing apps.
But they also noted that, “this could lead to unintended consequences for passengers’ star ratings and subsequent ability to request rides, if discriminating drivers who would otherwise decline or cancel a request are instead compelled to transport the passenger.”
To address the issue of female passengers being taken on longer rides, they suggested fixed fares between pick-up and drop-off points.
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