Consumer Surplus of Alternative Payment Methods
通过墨西哥优步乘车数据与三个大规模现场实验，估计了禁用现金支付后消费者剩余损失，发现现金用户平均损失约40-50%的乘车支出，且弱势群体受影响最大。
Abstract This paper estimates the consumer surplus from using alternative payment methods. We use evidence from Uber rides in Mexico, where riders have the option to use cash or cards to pay for rides. We design and conduct three large-scale field experiments, which involved approximately 400,000 riders. We also build a structural model which, disciplined by our new experimental data, allows us to estimate the loss of private benefits for riders when a ban on cash payments is implemented. We find that Uber riders who use cash as means of payment either sometimes or exclusively suffer an average loss of approximately 40–50% of their total trip expenditures paid in cash before the ban. The magnitude of these estimates reflects the intensity with which cash is used in the application, the shape of the demand curve for Uber rides, and the imperfect substitutability across means of payments. Welfare losses fall mostly on the least-advantaged households, who rely more heavily on the cash payment option.