Male Uber drivers earn an average of about 7 percent more per hour than female drivers, according to a study commissioned by Uber and carried out in collaboration with the University of Chicago and Stanford University.
Men average a pay rate of $21.28 per hour, while women earn roughly $1.24 less at $20.04 per hour on average, the study of more than 1.8 million drivers showed.
This was attempted to be explained by a variety of factors, including that women reportedly tend to drive slower than their male counterparts.
Women also reportedly earn $130 less per week than men working through the ride share application, which the study attributed in part to women driving fewer hours.
Male Uber drivers earn an average of 7 percent more per hour than female drivers, according to a study commissioned by Uber, conducted in collaboration with the University of Chicago and Stanford University
Uber’s public policy director, Jonathan Hall, rejected the notion that this disparity in pay should be addressed by raising the base wage of female Uber drivers by 7 percent, telling Freakonomics that would be discriminatory against men.
Instead, Uber officials said in a blog post that there is ‘no evidence that outright discrimination, either by the app or by riders, is driving the gender earnings gap.’
‘We are able to completely explain the pay gap with three main factors related to driver preferences and learning: returns to experience, a pay premium for faster driving, and preferences for where to drive,’ the study said.
The study showed male drivers were more likely to drive in higher paying locations, drive faster, accept trips with shorter distances to pick up the rider, and were more likely to accept longer trips.
‘Figure 1 (shown here) provides a graphical view of the hourly earnings gap for all US drivers from early 2015 through early 2017; The gap seen in Table 1 is fairly constant throughout the sample period; Pay of drivers fluctuates, but the changes are generally gender neutral,’ the study said
‘It makes sense to compensate people who are doing more productive work. It makes sense to pay people more if they work more hours,’ Stanford’s Rebecca Diamond told Freakonomics,
‘I mean, I don’t think those are things that we would ever consider thinking should be changed because that they’re a problem. Those are just real reasons that productivity can differ between men and women. And we should compensate people based on productivity.’
Women also had higher turnover rates as workers on the ride sharing platform, and drivers who have been driving longer have been shown to earn higher pay, according to the study.
Regarding the fact that women tend to work less hours, overall, on the platform, Uber executives acknowledged there were broader societal restrictions at play that even payment based on ‘doing the exact same job in a setting where work assignments are made by a gender-blind algorithm and pay structure’s tied directly to output and not negotiated’ have yet to alleviate.
John List, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago, Uber’s chief economist and lead author on the study, had a theory as to why on average, men work more hours and take more trips than women drivers using their app.
‘Part of it is because women have more constraints — i.e, take the kid to school in the morning. Be responsible for taking Johnny to the soccer game,’ List said.
List implied that these gender-based societal expectations that limit women’s availability to work through the Uber app.
He then went on to equate less time spent doing the physical work to amassing less experience, due to ‘less learning-by-doing.’
Uber’s chief economist John List and believes that men work more hours and take more trips than women drivers using their app due to gender-based societal expectations that limit women’s availability
‘Now as policy makers, what we want to do is make sure that we can alleviate those constraints as much as possible,’ List said.
The study concluded by naming external societal factors tied to traditional, gender-normative roles as the driving force behind the pay gap between its male and female drivers, and attributing those same factors to the gender pay gap in the work force, at large.
‘Overall, our results suggest that, even in the gender-blind, transactional, flexible environment of the gig economy, gender-based preferences (especially the value of time not spent at paid work and, for drivers, preferences for driving speed) can open gender earnings gaps,’ the study said.
‘The preference differences that contribute to pay differences in professional markets for lawyers and MBA’s also lead to earnings gaps for drivers on Uber, suggesting they are pervasive across the skill distribution and whether in the traditional or gig workplace.’
Diamond added:
‘I think this is showing that the gender pay gap is not likely to go away completely anytime soon. Unless somehow, things in our broader society really change, about how men and women are making choices about their broader lives, than just the labor market.’
The study concluded by naming external societal factors tied to traditional, gender-normative roles as the driving force behind the pay gap between its male and female drivers, and attributing those same factors to the gender pay gap in the work force, at large