IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/popmgt/v30y2021i10p3481-3496.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Gender‐Related Operational Issues Arising from On‐Demand Ride‐Hailing Platforms: Safety Concerns and System Configuration

Author

Listed:
  • Yanli Tang
  • Pengfei Guo
  • Christopher S. Tang
  • Yulan Wang

Abstract

Female user (driver and rider) safety is a serious concern for ride‐hailing platforms. One way to address this concern is to migrate from the traditional “pooling” system that matches riders with drivers without considering gender to a “hybrid” system with a “female‐only” option. Will such a hybrid system result in a win‐win‐win outcome for all involved parties (riders, drivers, and the platform)? To answer this question, we investigate the performance of the two operational systems: a pooling system and a hybrid system. For each system, we analyze a two‐stage queueing game to determine the equilibrium “joining” and “participating” behavior of riders and drivers, and then derive the platform's optimal pricing and wage decisions. We posit a mismatch cost incurred by a safety‐concerned female user when she is matched with a male counterpart in a ride. By comparing the equilibrium outcomes associated with the pooling and the hybrid systems, we draw the following conclusions: when safety‐concerned female users’ mismatch cost is above a certain level, switching from a pooling system to a hybrid system can result in a win‐win outcome for safety‐concerned female users and the platform. However, male and safety‐unconcerned female users might be worse off due to this change in the system configuration. Our results also help us to rectify some of our intuitions about these two systems. One, in the pooling system, reducing the mismatch cost associated with safety‐concerned female drivers may not lead to more female riders joining the pooling system, even though it boosts the platform's profit in general. Two, in the hybrid system, it is not necessary for female riders to pay a higher price when they opt for female drivers instead of male drivers. We also relate our results to certain system configurations adopted by various ride‐hailing platforms to address female safety concerns in different countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Yanli Tang & Pengfei Guo & Christopher S. Tang & Yulan Wang, 2021. "Gender‐Related Operational Issues Arising from On‐Demand Ride‐Hailing Platforms: Safety Concerns and System Configuration," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(10), pages 3481-3496, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:popmgt:v:30:y:2021:i:10:p:3481-3496
    DOI: 10.1111/poms.13444
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/poms.13444
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/poms.13444?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gihleb, Rania & Giuntella, Osea & Stella, Luca & Wang, Tianyi, 2022. "Industrial robots, Workers’ safety, and health," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    2. Gérard P. Cachon & Kaitlin M. Daniels & Ruben Lobel, 2017. "The Role of Surge Pricing on a Service Platform with Self-Scheduling Capacity," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 19(3), pages 368-384, July.
    3. Ioannis Bellos & Mark Ferguson & L. Beril Toktay, 2017. "The Car Sharing Economy: Interaction of Business Model Choice and Product Line Design," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 19(2), pages 185-201, May.
    4. Jiaru Bai & Kut C. So & Christopher S. Tang & Xiqun (Michael) Chen & Hai Wang, 2019. "Coordinating Supply and Demand on an On-Demand Service Platform with Impatient Customers," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 21(3), pages 556-570, July.
    5. Itf, 2020. "Monitoring Progress in Urban Road Safety," International Transport Forum Policy Papers 79, OECD Publishing.
    6. Jayaswal, Sachin & Jewkes, Elizabeth & Ray, Saibal, 2011. "Product differentiation and operations strategy in a capacitated environment," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 210(3), pages 716-728, May.
    7. Jean‐Charles Rochet & Jean Tirole, 2006. "Two‐sided markets: a progress report," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(3), pages 645-667, September.
    8. Zimei Liu & Kefan Xie & Ling Li & Yong Chen, 2020. "A paradigm of safety management in Industry 4.0," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(4), pages 632-645, July.
    9. Vidyanand Choudhary & Anindya Ghose & Tridas Mukhopadhyay & Uday Rajan, 2005. "Personalized Pricing and Quality Differentiation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(7), pages 1120-1130, July.
    10. Lim, Kar Ho & Hu, Wuyang & Nayga, Rodolfo, 2020. "Seeing Food Safety in Grass-fed Beef," 2020 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, Kansas City, Missouri 304421, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    11. Vasiliki Kostami & Dimitris Kostamis & Serhan Ziya, 2017. "Pricing and Capacity Allocation for Shared Services," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 19(2), pages 230-245, May.
    12. Chialin Chen, 2001. "Design for the Environment: A Quality-Based Model for Green Product Development," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 47(2), pages 250-263, February.
    13. Terry A. Taylor, 2018. "On-Demand Service Platforms," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 704-720, October.
    14. Itf, 2020. "Best Practice for Urban Road Safety: Case Studies," International Transport Forum Policy Papers 76, OECD Publishing.
    15. O. C. Ferrell & Dimitri Kapelianis & Linda Ferrell & Lynzie Rowland, 2018. "Expectations and Attitudes Toward Gender-Based Price Discrimination," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 152(4), pages 1015-1032, November.
    16. Horstmann, Niklas & Krämer, Jan, 2013. "Price discrimination or uniform pricing: Which colludes more?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 120(3), pages 379-383.
    17. Saif Benjaafar & Ming Hu, 2020. "Operations Management in the Age of the Sharing Economy: What Is Old and What Is New?," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 22(1), pages 93-101, January.
    18. Serguei Netessine & Terry A. Taylor, 2007. "Product Line Design and Production Technology," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 26(1), pages 101-117, 01-02.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Wei, Wanying & Liu, Weihua & Tang, Ou & Dong, Chuanwen & Liang, Yanjie, 2023. "CSR investment for a two-sided platform: Network externality and risk aversion," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 307(2), pages 694-712.
    2. Gallen, Yana & Wasserman, Melanie, 2023. "Does information affect homophily?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 222(C).
    3. Hossain, Mokter & Mozahem, Najib Ali, 2022. "Drivers’ perceptions of the sharing economy for transport services," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 179(C).
    4. Shixingyue Hu & Yazao Yang, 2024. "Safety of female ride-hailing passengers: Perception and prevention," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-18, December.
    5. Wenhui Zhou & Dongmei Wang & Weixiang Huang & Pengfei Guo, 2021. "To Pool or Not to Pool? The Effect of Loss Aversion on Queue Configurations," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(11), pages 4258-4272, November.
    6. Ke, Jintao & Li, Xinwei & Yang, Hai & Yin, Yafeng, 2021. "Pareto-efficient solutions and regulations of congested ride-sourcing markets with heterogeneous demand and supply," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    7. Hu, Shu & Tang, Yanli, 2024. "Impact of product sharing and heterogeneous consumers on manufacturers offering trade-in programs," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    8. Sun, Mingyao & Ng, Chi To & Wu, Feng & Cheng, T.C.E., 2022. "Optimization of after-sales services with spare parts consumption and repairman travel," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 244(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhang, Yu & Huang, Min & Tian, Lin & Cai, Gangshu George & Jin, Delong & Fan, Zhiping, 2023. "Manufacturer’s product line selling strategy and add-on policy in product sharing," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 308(3), pages 1332-1343.
    2. De Munck, Thomas & Chevalier, Philippe & Tancrez, Jean-Sébastien, 2023. "Managing priorities on on-demand service platforms with waiting time differentiation," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 266(C).
    3. Bin Dai & Yu Nu, 2020. "Pricing and capacity allocation strategies: Implications for manufacturers with product sharing," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 67(3), pages 201-222, April.
    4. Saif Benjaafar & Harald Bernhard & Costas Courcoubetis & Michail Kanakakis & Spyridon Papafragkos, 2022. "Drivers, Riders, and Service Providers: The Impact of the Sharing Economy on Mobility," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(1), pages 123-142, January.
    5. Ye, Fei & Ni, Debing & Li, Kevin W., 2021. "Competition between manufacturers and sharing economy platforms: An owner base and sharing utility perspective," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 234(C).
    6. Saif Benjaafar & Shining Wu & Hanlin Liu & Einar Bjarki Gunnarsson, 2022. "Dimensioning On-Demand Vehicle Sharing Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(2), pages 1218-1232, February.
    7. Chen, Mingyang & Zhao, Daozhi & Gong, Yeming & Rekik, Yacine, 2022. "An on-demand service platform with self-scheduling capacity: Uniform versus multiplier-based pricing," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 243(C).
    8. Jun Pei & Ping Yan & Subodha Kumar & Xinbao Liu, 2021. "How to React to Internal and External Sharing in B2C and C2C," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(1), pages 145-170, January.
    9. Lin Tian & Baojun Jiang & Yifan Xu, 2021. "Manufacturer’s Entry in the Product-Sharing Market," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 23(3), pages 553-568, May.
    10. Yang, Jie & Zhao, Daozhi & Wang, Zeyu & Xu, Chunqiu, 2022. "Impact of regulation on on-demand ride-sharing service: Profit-based target vs demand-based target," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    11. Yunke Mai & Bin Hu & Saša Pekeč, 2023. "Courteous or Crude? Managing User Conduct to Improve On-Demand Service Platform Performance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(2), pages 996-1016, February.
    12. Hossein Abouee‐Mehrizi & Opher Baron & Oded Berman & David Chen, 2021. "Adoption of Electric Vehicles in Car Sharing Market," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(1), pages 190-209, January.
    13. Zenan Zhou & Xiang Wan, 2022. "Does the Sharing Economy Technology Disrupt Incumbents? Exploring the Influences of Mobile Digital Freight Matching Platforms on Road Freight Logistics Firms," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 31(1), pages 117-137, January.
    14. Ming Hu, 2021. "From the Classics to New Tunes: A Neoclassical View on Sharing Economy and Innovative Marketplaces," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(6), pages 1668-1685, June.
    15. Hu, Xinru & Zhou, Shuiyin & Luo, Xiaomeng & Li, Jianbin & Zhang, Chi, 2024. "Optimal pricing strategy of an on-demand platform with cross-regional passengers," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    16. Benioudakis, Myron & Zissis, Dimitris & Burnetas, Apostolos & Ioannou, George, 2023. "Service provision on an aggregator platform with time-sensitive customers: Pricing strategies and coordination," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 257(C).
    17. Vibhanshu Abhishek & Jose A. Guajardo & Zhe Zhang, 2021. "Business Models in the Sharing Economy: Manufacturing Durable Goods in the Presence of Peer-to-Peer Rental Markets," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 32(4), pages 1450-1469, December.
    18. He, Shan & Dai, Ying & Ma, Zu-Jun, 2023. "To offer or not to offer? The optimal value-insured strategy for crowdsourced delivery platforms," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    19. Liu, Yang & Li, Sen, 2023. "An economic analysis of on-demand food delivery platforms: Impacts of regulations and integration with ride-sourcing platforms," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).
    20. Vishal V. Agrawal & Atalay Atasu & Luk N. Van Wassenhove, 2019. "OM Forum—New Opportunities for Operations Management Research in Sustainability," Service Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 1-12, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:popmgt:v:30:y:2021:i:10:p:3481-3496. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1937-5956 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.