IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0198491.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Understanding the unbalance of interest in taxi market based on drivers' service profit margins

Author

Listed:
  • Beibei Hu
  • Yawen Kong
  • Mengge Sun
  • Xianlei Dong
  • Gang Zong

Abstract

Nowadays, ride-hailing services have been established as a part of the urban transportation. Their arrival has remade the profit structure and resulted in the unbalance of interest in taxi market. Here, we establish the service models of taxis, carpooling, and car-hailing under “Internet +” from the perspective of profit margins, to perform a comparative analysis among the different services. Results: First, Profit margins are generally higher for short trips than for long trips, though empty cruise fee to a certain degree make up for the driver’s decreased profit margins. Second, the profit margin for carpooling is roughly 1.85 times that of ride-hailing, and 1.75 times that of taxis. This shows that the sharing economy has a certain advantage. Third, Profit margins are higher and fluctuations are lower on non-work days than on work days. At last, Profit margins are roughly 1.3 times higher on non-congested roads than on congested roads. The reduced profitability on congested roads makes it even harder to catch a ride during rush hours and on congested roads. We suggest that the relevant departments make appropriate efforts to make it more attractive for drivers to take on passengers during rush hours and on congested roads, and promote the sharing in the taxi market.

Suggested Citation

  • Beibei Hu & Yawen Kong & Mengge Sun & Xianlei Dong & Gang Zong, 2018. "Understanding the unbalance of interest in taxi market based on drivers' service profit margins," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(6), pages 1-18, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0198491
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0198491
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0198491
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0198491&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0198491?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. Yang, Hai & Leung, Cowina W.Y. & Wong, S.C. & Bell, Michael G.H., 2010. "Equilibria of bilateral taxi-customer searching and meeting on networks," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 44(8-9), pages 1067-1083, September.
    2. Jianqi Liu & Jiafu Wan & Qinruo Wang & Pan Deng & Keliang Zhou & Yupeng Qiao, 2016. "A survey on position-based routing for vehicular ad hoc networks," Telecommunication Systems: Modelling, Analysis, Design and Management, Springer, vol. 62(1), pages 15-30, May.
    3. Jonathan V. Hall & Alan B. Krueger, 2015. "An Analysis of the Labor Market for Uber's Driver-Partners in the United States," Working Papers 587, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    4. Yang, Hai & Wong, S. C. & Wong, K. I., 2002. "Demand-supply equilibrium of taxi services in a network under competition and regulation," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 36(9), pages 799-819, November.
    5. Yang, Hai & Wong, S. C., 1998. "A network model of urban taxi services," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 235-246, May.
    6. Judd Cramer & Alan B. Krueger, 2016. "Disruptive Change in the Taxi Business: The Case of Uber," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(5), pages 177-182, May.
    7. Yang, Hai & Ye, Min & Tang, Wilson H. & Wong, S.C., 2005. "Regulating taxi services in the presence of congestion externality," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 17-40, January.
    8. Harding, Simon & Kandlikar, Milind & Gulati, Sumeet, 2016. "Taxi apps, regulation, and the market for taxi journeys," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 15-25.
    9. Dali Wei & Changwei Yuan & Hongchao Liu & Dayong Wu & Wesley Kumfer, 2017. "The Impact of Service Refusal to the Supply–Demand Equilibrium in the Taxicab Market," Networks and Spatial Economics, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 225-253, March.
    10. Yang, Hai & Fung, C.S. & Wong, K.I. & Wong, S.C., 2010. "Nonlinear pricing of taxi services," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 44(5), pages 337-348, June.
    11. David Watling & Giulio Cantarella, 2015. "Model Representation & Decision-Making in an Ever-Changing World: The Role of Stochastic Process Models of Transportation Systems," Networks and Spatial Economics, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 843-882, September.
    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. Xuanxuan Xia & Kexin Lin & Yang Ding & Xianlei Dong & Huijun Sun & Beibei Hu, 2020. "Research on the Coupling Coordination Relationships between Urban Function Mixing Degree and Urbanization Development Level Based on Information Entropy," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(1), pages 1-24, December.
    2. Pinaki DASGUPTA & Arnab DEB, 2022. "Service Pricing Challenges On Shared Platform: Uber India Vs Didi Chuxing," Management and Marketing Journal, University of Craiova, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, vol. 0(1), pages 23-33, May.

    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. Szeto, W.Y. & Wong, R.C.P. & Yang, W.H., 2019. "Guiding vacant taxi drivers to demand locations by taxi-calling signals: A sequential binary logistic regression modeling approach and policy implications," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 100-110.
    2. Li, Baicheng & Szeto, W.Y., 2021. "Modeling and analyzing a taxi market with a monopsony taxi owner and multiple rentee-drivers," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 1-22.
    3. Yang, Hai & Yang, Teng, 2011. "Equilibrium properties of taxi markets with search frictions," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 45(4), pages 696-713, May.
    4. Wang, Hai & Yang, Hai, 2019. "Ridesourcing systems: A framework and review," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 122-155.
    5. Li, Baicheng & Szeto, W.Y., 2019. "Taxi service area design: Formulation and analysis," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 308-333.
    6. Wong, R.C.P. & Szeto, W.Y. & Wong, S.C., 2014. "Bi-level decisions of vacant taxi drivers traveling towards taxi stands in customer-search: Modeling methodology and policy implications," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 73-81.
    7. Xu, Zhengtian & Yin, Yafeng & Zha, Liteng, 2017. "Optimal parking provision for ride-sourcing services," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 559-578.
    8. Fabien Leurent, 2019. "Microeconomics of a taxi service in a ring-shaped city," Working Papers hal-02047269, HAL.
    9. Nourinejad, Mehdi & Ramezani, Mohsen, 2020. "Ride-Sourcing modeling and pricing in non-equilibrium two-sided markets," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 340-357.
    10. Long, Jiancheng & Szeto, W.Y. & Du, Jie & Wong, R.C.P., 2017. "A dynamic taxi traffic assignment model: A two-level continuum transportation system approach," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 222-254.
    11. Nourinejad, Mehdi & Roorda, Matthew J., 2017. "Impact of hourly parking pricing on travel demand," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 28-45.
    12. Pueboobpaphan, Suthatip & Indra-Payoong, Nakorn & Opasanon, Sathaporn, 2019. "Experimental analysis of variable surcharge policy of taxi service auction," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 134-148.
    13. Sathaye, Nakul, 2014. "The optimal design and cost implications of electric vehicle taxi systems," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 264-283.
    14. Thorsten Heilker & Gernot Sieg, 2017. "A duopoly of transportation network companies and traditional radio-taxi dispatch service agencies," Working Papers 24, Institute of Transport Economics, University of Muenster.
    15. Wong, R.C.P. & Szeto, W.Y., 2022. "The effects of peak hour and congested area taxi surcharges on customers’ travel decisions: Empirical evidence and policy implications," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 78-89.
    16. 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).
    17. Wong, K.I. & Wong, S.C. & Yang, Hai & Wu, J.H., 2008. "Modeling urban taxi services with multiple user classes and vehicle modes," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 42(10), pages 985-1007, December.
    18. Rathore, Bhawana & Sengupta, Pooja & Biswas, Baidyanath & Kumar, Ajay, 2024. "Predicting the price of taxicabs using Artificial Intelligence: A hybrid approach based on clustering and ordinal regression models," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 185(C).
    19. Ting Wang & Yong Zhang & Meiye Li & Lei Liu, 2019. "How Do Passengers with Different Using Frequencies Choose between Traditional Taxi Service and Online Car-Hailing Service? A Case Study of Nanjing, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(23), pages 1-18, November.
    20. Yang, Hai & Fung, C.S. & Wong, K.I. & Wong, S.C., 2010. "Nonlinear pricing of taxi services," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 44(5), pages 337-348, June.

    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:plo:pone00:0198491. 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: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    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.