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It's Harder To Get an Uber or Lyft If You're Black, Study Says (time.com)
Black riders have to wait "significantly longer" for their Uber cabs and experience "double" the cancellation rates of white passengers, according to a new study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. The study, which also observed a similar pattern among Lyft drivers, claims it has found "significant evidence of racial discrimination" in ride-hailing services based on a pair of experiments in Seattle and Boston. From a report on Time: Researchers pulled data from more than 1,400 field tests conducted using mostly Uber and Lyft, but also traditional taxi services. The findings in Boston and Seattle showed evidence of discrimination that manifested in either longer waits or a higher likelihood for cancellation. In Seattle, African-American UberX users on average waited 5 minutes and 15 seconds for pick-ups -- roughly 30% longer than white riders, who waited 4 minutes on average. Lyft users did not experience a significant difference during the experiment. When the research assistants switched between using white-sounding and African-American-sounding names, they did not find a significant increase in their wait times. But the overall rates at which drivers canceled the ride after it was assigned to them was more than one in 10 for riders with black-sounding names, roughly double than for riders with white-sounding names.
Soooooo...!!
Maybe if they didn't commit a disproportionate number of crimes, they'd get the same service.
That's somebodies car.
This is further proof that these are really just taxi companies.
What are these African-American sounding names? Are you saying that you can tell someone's race by their name? But if races are social constructs and not real, what are they really measuring?
Have you ever known an African American with an "African-American-sounding name"?
Me neither.
This is stupid.
its more the drivers are not going into a crime laden naberhood. unfortunately for the black guy he probably lives there.
This is sad, but not really surprising, and is just one more example of why Uber/Lyft are going to be a disaster for the country once they more completely displace the regulated taxi industry.
Like what, mohammads? That wiuld be a jihaddists-sounding name and no sane person would pick that up.
So maybe it might make sense to name children with more "American" sounding names rather than [made-up] supposedly African ones? I am not saying such discrimination is right, just pointing out it shouldn't be a surprise there are some real-world effects when choosing a name like "Latishquia."
In other news, I bet Muslim-sounding names have a harder time too. Is that surprising?
It might be a good idea for such services to use a nickname or "handle" or just numeric login name for relaying the information to the drivers, releasing the real name only when the actual ride begins....
Were user ratings equal between the ethnicities? Drivers will less likely accept a passenger if his/her user rating is lower than average.
I'd really be interested, are there now names for blacks and names for whites? I thought we're finally over that shit.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It's not that the riders were black, but rather that the names chosen "sounded black". This is significant as it introduces culture as a possible data point which wasn't controlled for.
Were I a freelance driver, I'm not sure how much I'd want to deal with a "La-DASH-ya" either.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
...do their apps specify race when you are reserving a ride?
Or maybe it's because the pick up point is in a high crime area.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
...people are cunts. Film at 11.
Quick! Someone do a TED talk!
Seastead this.
I'd rather wait for a bus than use either of these services. At least the driver lets me drink my beer in peace.
Really? You don't say!
We've known this for decades. The motivation behind Affirmative action was based on hard data. (Weather or not its a good idea or implementation is a different question)
With the rise of big data stuff like this is going to be more common. - If for no other reason that there is money to be made gauging a conumers preferences. Those include race related ones.
Mohammed: Did you see Mohammed at the meeting today?
Mohammed: No, but his brother Mohammed showed up.
Mohammed: What did Mohammed talk about?
Mohammed: Mohammed introduced us to Mohammed who is also a mason!
Mohammed: A mason? No shit? How long has he been one?
Mohammed: About five years. He was referred to the local lodge by Mohammed.
Mohammed: Ah, yes, Mohammed. He has a shit ton of connections around town!
Mohammed: Yes, and our brothers, police be upon them, Mohammed and Mohammed from Egypt came, too.
Mohammed: I've been thinking of becoming a clown.
Mohammed: A clown, Mohammed, why?
Mohammed: So I can film myself being gay.
Mohammed: Oh, you.
Mohammed: So anyway, is Mohammed, Mohammed, and Mohammed coming to the next party?
Mohammed: Indeed. Mohammed was so funny last time.
Mohammed: Well it wouldn't be a party without Mohammed.
Mohammed: Yes, my friend. POLICE BE UPON THEM!
Uber drivers dont get my real name, they get my handle. There is no reason for them to know my true full name. UBER, my WISP and CC company has the relevant info if a legal issue arises.
Good-bye
It's Harder to get an Uber or Lyft If You Have a Stupid Sounding Name, Study Says
I delivered pizzas as a part-time job when I was in high school. One particular area had a high black population. All the drivers hated delivering there and would try to skip out on the delivery (go to bathroom, take a break, etc), not because the customers were black, but because they didn't tip well. The same thing happened in another area which was predominantly white, but low income (also bad tippers).
Technically this still counts as a prejudice (pre-judging the customer as a bad tipper based solely on where they live). But it's one which is statistically correct most of the time rather than some of the time.
Wait a second. If I am a private driver, in my private vehicle, and I am not providing a service but just ride sharing, then any and all hailers are hitchhikers. Such as they are hitchhikers, it is my personal discretion who I allow into my vehicle and who do I not.
Now on the other hand, if I was working for a transportation service, hauling people around is my job, and I wouldn't care less who is in the car as long as they are paying.
I have so far taken in only one hitchhiker in my car, I was stopped in front of a one lane 2 way tunnel waiting for my direction to be allowed in, and there was a smelly woman in dirty muddy rags by the side of the road. There were some vandals or whatcha-call-em, perhaps hooligans, in the two cars behind me, who got out of their cars and started to harass the woman, so I let her in as she was in immediate distress. Other than that, I see no reason to haul around hitchhikers.
the)re are Some
"When the research assistants switched between using white-sounding and African-American-sounding names"
African-America "sounding names" well that's scientific.
Oh wait no that's racist.
Would you pick up someone named Judas Iscariot? Adolf Hitler? Josef Stalin?
Why would someone name their child a name that makes it harder for them in life?
Just like cops shooting people of color at 2-10 times the rate of whites is a coincidence.
Right.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
If the pickup was at night it's entirely possible that the drivers simply could not see the black passengers...
Given that living locations vary greatly by cost, I'd say realizing that low cost living leads to low tip amounts is not pre-judgement at all. It's basic econ. The local Range Rover dealership isn't marketing to the bad tippers either.
I'm not faulting the delivery drivers (who were "selfishly" looking out for themselves just as much as a poorer person tipping less), but I'm academically curious whether the reluctance to deliver to those areas leads to a self fulfilling prophecy - slower delivery times that deserve a smaller tip, leads to slower delivery times, leads to smaller tips...
Having also delivered pizza. The _worst_ tippers are in the rich neighborhoods and the ghetto. People that also _work_ for a living are likely to tip decently.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Maybe they tip less because they get poorer service as all the drivers waste time trying to avoid going there. Creates a feedback loop.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Its not racist at all. With birth records, you can map a person's name as well as their race, and all kinds of random other data.
If Eliyah are almost entirely named to black babies, it's a 'black' name statistically.
If Cody's are almost entirely named to white babies, it's a 'white' name statistically.
Once you've got a baseline of extreme limits of 'white', 'black', 'hyspanic', 'asian', etc.. names, you can perform blind tests on how people react to different names. There's nothing racist about it. Its pretty simple to quantify.
The hard names are those used by all cultures, which is why researchers don't use those names when performing these types of tests.
Bye!
...had something to do with it.
They will figure it out. Parents in the '70s learned not to name their kids "Dick Butkiss" because of all the teasing the kids would get at school. Parents in this millennium will figure out not to name their kids something that would prevent Uber from picking them up.
- First the actual source link is: http://www.usatoday.com/story/...
- Second, there is no data released.
- Third, gotta call "whites" european-americans if we go by that logic.
Release the data, if you want people to take these studies as seriously as they need to be.
they hate going but one driver still had to go no matter what, so no, your point is invalid. its just the culture of some areas.
"...they did not find a significant increase in their wait times. But the overall rates at which drivers canceled the ride after it was assigned to them was .. roughly double than for riders with white-sounding names."
Rather than just conveniently assume "racism" they should first dig a little deeper and, say, check with the drivers themselves for the existence of other correlations.
...the fact is, stereotypes don't come from a vacuum.
Sorry. If you don't want your kid to wait for a cab, name them Michael or Kathy, not T'quan or Yuneek.
that LaTrina has the same right to a job she's qualified for as Richard? You're basically saying racism's OK as long as it's not too bleeding obvious. Speaking of which, of course nobody f'n had to test LaTrina vs Harley. They never got that far because the most ridiculous test cases blew up first. You would think folks would at least _try_ to hide their racism. Not so much.
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And? I don't think anyone contests that. But the researcher haven't tried to see if the wait times would go up if they used identifying markers for other groups. Vegetarians? Republicans? Or, more narrowly, Trump supporters? Using "black" sounding names is a marker which makes it more likely that a person belongs to a certain group. It doesn't prove that this group experiences more hostility than individuals from other groups which are generally judged by their group membership. A study from a few years ago showed that Prius drivers were the most hostile drivers on the road. So group-affiliation can be an indication of anti-social behavior just as much it can make a person be more likely to be on the receiving end of anti-social behavior. They should do a study of what the delay would be if the desired destination is a Trump rally vs a sporting event (to eliminate congestion as a baseline for bias against driving to a location).
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
you're legally required to validate each candidate on their merits. If you've done what you just suggested then you haven't followed the law. Casual and institutional racism are still racism.
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as long as La-dash-ya is well behaved and gives you no cause for concern you are legally required to accept her business when you run a public business. The same protections extend to you and everyone else and for reasons to innumerable to list.
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Uber doesn't allow tips. Mind you, the drivers are all absolutely still private contractors thank you very much.
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they start with a hypothesis, test it, and if they get positive results refine. John Oliver just did a very amusing piece on the whole process and how silly it is when lay people jump into a discussion like this one we're having without reading study's statistics and just reading the headline instead.
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My word, he's not "employable", either. Sir Richard employs others, not vice-versa. The very idea.
Also, sir Richard is on the Riviera at this time, so would you kindly cease pestering the house staff. Go on, now.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
That isn't what is typically done in these studies. Rather than using a valid method (statistical correlates of names with race) they instead use forced choice ratios.
They ask a sample of 100 people is __name__ black or white?
Then based on the forced choice percentages they assign a 'race' to the name.
They tend to also use extremely common 'white' names and extremely uncommon 'black' names (The studies that have used common black names such as Ebony; show that the common black name ends up with better response rates than the less common white names).
Nope, didn't matter how fast I delivered to those places.
Based on the summery it sounds like:
1) The overall statistics for Uber implied that Black people on average got worse service.
2) Some scientists ran a proper study with controls and found that no discrimination was happening.
3) So we are left with the glaringly obvious conclusion that Uber drivers probably do not wait around in crime filled neighborhoods, and are more likely to refuse to service crime filled neighborhoods.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
'Black sounding names'? As for the Person of Color v. White people wait and cancellation time - was any consideration made for the neighborhoods and the times of day the rides were requested?
I don't remember any thing in the uber app that identifies the race of the requester. How can there be a bias. Not saying that it doesn't exist but not seeing how it happens
When I was in college I volunteered in a community service group and became one of the managers. I noticed that one of the other managers complained a lot about his volunteers -- they had a bad attitude, they weren't reliable, etc. Which was weird because I'd worked with the same people and found them to be perfectly reliable and enthusiastic. So I began to watch this guy, and the problem became obvious: he was a condescending jerk who pissed his volunteers off, and when they wouldn't work with him anymore he'd badmouth them. Then the other managers would get a negative attitude towards that volunteer and he'd end up quitting.
Now I don't want to overstate the case here, but there is such a thing as a self-fulfilling prophecy. If drivers try to avoid low-income neighborhoods, then people in that neighborhood will experience, on average, bad service from your pizzeria. Even when a delivery is on time, expecting it to be late poisons the experience. It takes a lot of good customer service to undo even a single instance of bad service, much less a pattern of it.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I wonder why this might be the case. Could it be due to the fact that people are more likely to be robbed by black people than white / asian people? No that would not make sense. Could it be that black people have a great time intimidating and scaring the shit out of those pansy crackers. No that is crazy. It must be because all white people hate black people. Yes, it is because all whites are inherently racist.
In my country we have pagan celebrations with a procession of white versus black painted people. We don't call Africans 'black' in our language. A black person is an evil person and it has nothing to do with skin color. Yet that pagan celebration that occurs in mid-winter and mid-summer is now banned because it has been considered racist by some American chick who has too much power through the UN. She sees people with white paint and black paint and screams "black faces", completely ignoring the fact that this pagan fest is over 3000 years old.
The old Nazi collaborators were called black. The 'sub-Saharan' Africans where named with the 'n' word in our language. The 'n' word didn't have any negative meaning in our language. In fact it is also used to name the color when dressed in black. But this word has been banned. You now have the awkward situation where older people feel offended when someone younger says they wear a nice 'black' t-shirt. And the other way around a younger person who feels uneasy when an older person says they wear a nice 'n'-word t-shirt.
Now this 'when you're black' thing again. In my language it just means when you are a unpleasant, maybe evil, person. When I look at the Star Wars story, there is also the Light side and Dark side, the white versus black. It is American pop culture where there is still a feeling of white is good and black is evil, just like in our country. Political correctness has banned the use of some words because they are considered racist. Now we end up using words that simply mean something bad. So a black person is still a bad person, but because you also have to use black person for someone with an ebony colored skin the unconsciousness says it is a bad person.
One remarkable thing was a woman from Ghana who emigrated to our country because people in her country harassed her because she had a black skin. Indeed her skin was really black, not ebony. The ebony Ghanese were racist towards a pure black woman (some genetic disorder) and she had to move to a white country to escape racism. So one has to ask, is it really racism or is there also a lot of millennia old tradition of white versus black (day versus night?) that plays a role?
Black ravens, black cats, black cloths, ... it is all more on the bad/evil side. Because we have to call 'black people' black to not be racist, we actually compare them with the 'evilness' of the color black. Does this make sense at all what I'm thinking? This is a question I would really like to pose to those anti-racism 'scientists' to hear their opinion or simply to see if they are really researching or simply have an opinion they hold as the only truth.
Heard this on the radio today.
Great to know good old slashdot is now in lock-step with the mainstream media programming and calling it 'tech'.
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
If providing a ride for a black person was a good experience, to and from a safe location, and profitable, they would be preferred.
Such as "Dwyane" instead of "Dwayne", and "Antawn" instead of "Antoine". Strangely they aren't pronounced the way they are spelled. Maybe not so strange - probably indicates the literacy level of their parents.
Uber and Lyft emphasized that they do not tolerate discrimination and their belief that ride-sharing apps make transportation more equitable and available than taxis.
That was borne out when researchers had students hail cabs in downtown Seattle. The first available taxi stopped 60% of the time for a white student but less than 20% of the time for black students. The white students never had more than four taxis pass them before one stopped. African-American students saw six or seven cabs pass them in 20% of cases.
citation
'The tyrant will always find pretext for his tyranny.' - Aesop's Fables
Or the smart thing to do is just not delivery to crime ridden slums.
It's not just "technically" prejudice, it's systemic racism which is usually backed up by valid statistics, but still harmful to society. Racism (and sexism, etc.) has nothing to do with statistics being right or wrong, but about creating an equal playing field.
Why don't all the poor, hard done by blacks just agree to live only with whites who WANT to live with them?
Oh, wait... that would be about one percent of white people, wouldn't it.
Why don't all the poor, hard done by blacks want to live AROUND THEIR OWN KIND? Like in Africa, for example?
Why aren't millions of white people moving to AFRICA every year, if we all want 'diversity', as the JEW media keeps telling us?
I've been to USA and i have to say, of all the races the blacks are the most chaotic and crazy.
Homophobia is also quite big in the black collective, far more than even your rednecks.
Yup. It might be that Uber drivers avoid certain neighborhoods. Or that people with "African-American sounding names" have a different time schedule which triggers longer waits. Or that ... But no, let's cry racism before knowing anything. Because that worked so well for the boy that cried wolf, didn't it?
I mean, honestly. Nïggers are violent, unpredictable, sub-human beasts that are more likely steal your car, rob you at gunpoint, or just beat the shit out of you for no reason - because they're nïggers, and that's what nïggers do. Everyone knows this is true, even if they pretend like they don't. Prejudice exists because stereotypes do not evolve in a vacuum.
"It's Harder To Get an Uber or Lyft If You Have a Black-sounding Name , Study Says." There are many blacks that have 'white-sounding' names like, say, Danny Glover or James (Earl) Jones or Sam(uel) Jackson - all of which are famous black actors - who would fall in the well-served 'white-sounding name' category of this study.
Technically this still counts as a prejudice (pre-judging the customer as a bad tipper based solely on where they live). But it's one which is statistically correct most of the time rather than some of the time.
You sure about that? It would be interesting to have data from your own deliveries to back it up.
I know I've seen general studies about tipping behavior in restaurants. Those show black people tipping wee bit less on average, but also reporting receiving worse service. Given that the service happens before the tipping, and its *supposed* to be a reward for good service ...
When the research assistants switched between using white-sounding and African-American-sounding names, they did not find a significant increase in their wait times.
This is the actual result: no discrimination in wait times. Average wait times by race doesn't prove discrimination because race is correlated with other things like location.
But the overall rates at which drivers canceled the ride after it was assigned to them was more than one in 10 for riders with black-sounding names, roughly double than for riders with white-sounding names.
This sounds like a significant result.
However it's already tracked by the service and does not sound like a major inconvenience. Compare it to how hard it is to hail a cab while black: no tracking to fix the problem, and subjectively a much larger problem.
tl;dr should be "Uber and Lyft reduce discrimination."
And personally I fucking hate cab apps because privacy and don't use them, and am scared of being forced to use them by shift in market size.
You may remember them from such eye-opening studies as the dubya-administration funded study on why prisoners want to escape from prison.
I posted this 'discovery' weeks ago, and now it seems to have an enhanced validity: I learned that Uber drivers actually RATE THEIR PASSENGERS!! and communicate that rating to their network... I thought this practice could be an instrument for discrimination: a driver getting a call from a user of the service can first view the ratings of that passenger's earlier history ... and low ratings based on color or neighborhoods could affect how the driver responds to the call.... independent of the caller's name.
This practice is outrageous!
"There are 11 kinds of people: those who know binary, those who don't, and those who could not care less!"
I delivered pizzas as a part-time job when I was in high school. One particular area had a high black population. All the drivers hated delivering there and would try to skip out on the delivery (go to bathroom, take a break, etc), not because the customers were black, but because they didn't tip well. The same thing happened in another area which was predominantly white, but low income (also bad tippers).
Technically this still counts as a prejudice (pre-judging the customer as a bad tipper based solely on where they live). But it's one which is statistically correct most of the time rather than some of the time.
Those who have low incomes tend to be poor tippers because they have LOW incomes. What a revelation!
I wonder if the same people that performed the study could run stats on tipping habits of AA vs rest of population. If African Americans tip less, then that might explain the lesser enthusiasm to serve them. I'm not being facetious.
I used to bag groceries when I was in high school, and back then the bagger would bring the groceries to your car for you and load them. They were frequently tipped, but not much.
We didn't have very many black people, so I didn't worry about them not tipping (there was one ghetto-looking family that for some reason felt entitled to park in the fire lane instead of getting a parking space like everyone else). However, I did learn to discriminate against people based on how many groceries they bought. I found that invariably, the people who bought so much stuff that it took 2 full carts would NEVER tip. Worse, these people usually expected me to push *both* carts at once! So I always tried to skip out on these jerks. People who bought 3 carts' worth of stuff, however, were good tippers, so it was important to be able to judge just how many carts of groceries they had bought. Also, old people were shitty tippers; they'd have expensive Cadillacs and give you a lecture about not slamming the trunk shut because it's auto-closing, but then get in their car and start it up and let you breathe fumes while loading the trunk. Middle-aged people with decent cars were the best tippers, frequently not getting that much stuff but still tipping the most (except maybe for the rare 3-cart shopper).
Unfortunately, it is true about black people and tipping: they're notoriously bad about it.
They will just rob you.
Reminds me of a lot of the hookers around here. Not the $50 streetwalkers, but the decent escorts. Won't see black guys. Even (especially) the black girls want nothing to do with black guys. When you ask why? They try to cheat out on paying them or haggle over price too much. They're cheap.
I know the article is trying to frame it as white, middle-class Uber drivers being racist fucks. Which is probably true. I think there might be larger cultural problems in the black community we're willfully overlooking, though. Is it still racist if black chicks from the ghetto want nothing to do with black dudes of ANY social strata?
For once Grish, we are in agreement.
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2003/03/20/mr-optimus-or-sgt-prime/
I actually met this guy in Camp Slayer Iraq 2007 and ate dinner with him. Many folks think it's military urban legend but it's ridiculously easy to get a name change. If your dad thought it would be clever to Johnny Cash that ass and name you Sue, you don't have to put up with that shit once you hit 18.
Now I don't want to overstate the case here, but there is such a thing as a self-fulfilling prophecy. If low-income neighborhoods treat pizza drivers like shit, then people in that neighborhood will experience, on average, bad service from your pizzeria. Even when a delivery is on time, expecting them to not tip (or worse, complain) poisons the experience. It takes a lot of good experiences to undo even a single instance of bad confrontation, much less a pattern of it.
I changed it around a bit to show another side of the coin.
When reading your comment, I was on pins and needles waiting to see who you were going to relate the bad manager to --
blacks going around bitching that everyone treats them wrong, and therefore people get fed up with that and start treating them wrong
or drivers going around bitching that blacks always treat them wrong, and therefore provide poor service
I wasn't surprised when I reached your final analysis, but I did have an internal chuckle at the conundrum up to that point.
I just don't care. The possibility that someone grew up with poor parents and was too proud to change their name to make you feel better about them has probably never crossed your mind. If it has you've been quick to dismiss it because thinking about real racism might put you on the hook for doing something practical about it instead of something that "feels good".
My comment is still 100% valid. Her name tells you nothing about her as an individual. Only the circumstances of her birth.
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It's harder to just get on with shit when your so occupied with what colour every fucker is. Give it a rest already. Racism hasn't even a chance of going away while you're all on about black this, white that, brown, yellow, red and all the rest of it (apparently only black and white are the ones worth a damn though). Same with gender. Is white cop shoots innocent black person any worse than black cop shoots innocent white person and are either worse than cop shoots innocent person? If your answer is yes, you're part of the problem.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
I'm glad you've finally came to terms with your racism. I'm also happy you forgot to check Anonymous.
Works both ways though. I lived in a condo three doors down from a pizza place (we were good tippers, but I'm guessing most people weren't).
Due to proximity, you could call up on busiest of nights, ask for a delivery, they'd say "Not delivering tonight, where you at?" -- they'd deliver when we told them (guess they got a LOT of business).