Social Security and High-Frequency Labor Supply: Evidence from Uber Drivers

We estimate the impact of anticipated transfers on labor supply using confidential driver-level data from Uber. Leveraging the staggered timing of Social Security retirement benefits within each month and a novel identification strategy, we find that the labor supply of older drivers declines by 2% on average in the week around benefit receipt—a precisely estimated but economically small effect. Individual-level analyses reveal that the average effect obscures heterogeneous micro-behavior: while the majority of drivers does not meaningfully adjust labor supply in response to social security benefits, a small group reduces labor supply by more than 40%. The results suggest that departures from standard models of labor supply are meaningful but only for a small number of individuals.