Ride-hailing apps like Uber and Lyft are making a difference when it comes to cutting down racial discrimination in wait times, according to a new study from Carnegie Mellon University. However, Black passengers still face higher cancellation rates compared to white riders.

The study found that while drivers were nearly twice as likely to cancel on someone with a Black-sounding name, the app's rapid rematching technology helped level the playing field by reducing wait time differences. This is a significant improvement for ride-share services, which have long struggled with discrimination issues.

"The technology is mitigating a social issue, which is pretty rare," said lead researcher Jeremy Michalek, highlighting the role of app algorithms in overcoming biases.

According to the findings, at least 3% of drivers appear to be discriminating based on race, causing cancellation discrepancies reported in previous studies. However, the research also showed that the ability of these services to quickly rematch riders to new drivers nearly eliminated the impact of driver racial prejudice on wait times.

Racial discrimination in transportation has been a problem since the taxi-cab days. As part of the study, researchers performed simulations of all the rides taken in Chicago before and after the COVID-19 pandemic on various days.

"Discrimination is having little effect on average wait times, at least in part because these apps are able to quickly rematch when somebody cancels. Whereas with taxis it was a very hard problem to solve," said Jeremy Michale, the faculty lead on the study and a professor of mechanical engineering and public policy.

The research is also unique because it "distinguishes between two types of discrimination," said Anna Cobb, a doctorate student and an author of the study.

The discrimination types are "direct, like when a driver cancels on a rider because of their race, and systemic, where history has informed patterns in where people live so that even when the effects of direct discrimination are small or disappear altogether, disparities can persist," she explained."Being able to distinguish these effects can help inform how we address the disparities we observe in the real world."

Even when drivers treat everyone similarly, the study found that Black riders in Chicago have significantly longer wait times because of where they live. A lengthy history of discriminatory policies, including redlining, has shaped Chicago's residential patterns, as have other variables such as inherited properties and affluence. The Black population is currently concentrated in South Chicago, which is further away from major downtown districts, resulting in fewer drivers available to pick up customers.

Tags Discrimination, Carnegie Mellon University, Uber