An empirical study of the labor supply of ride-sourcing drivers

ABSTRACT

The work scheduling flexibility enjoyed by drivers of ride-sourcing platforms poses challenges for these platforms in effectively managing their workforce. A key to resolving these challenges is to understand how drivers set up their work schedule so as to inform management decisions. This letter summarizes our investigation of ride-sourcing drivers’ working hour decisions. Leveraging comprehensive data from Didi Chuxing, a ride-hailing company in China, we calibrate two classic models from previous studies on taxi labor markets to examine drivers’ reactions to earnings in deciding their working hours. Our results suggest that, when deciding whether to continue a shift, drivers pay more attention to future income opportunities and the time already spent working rather than their current earning level.

KEYWORDS:

• Ride-sourcing
• freelance drivers
• labor supply
• working hours

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Dr. Pinghua Gong’s team at Didi Chuxing for their professional and invaluable assistance in data preparation for this empirical research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was partly supported by research grants from the National Science Foundation [CMMI-1740865] and Didi Chuxing.