scholarly journals Cyclical Variation in Labor Hours and Productivity Using the ATUS

2013 ◽  
Vol 103 (3) ◽  
pp. 99-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael C Burda ◽  
Daniel S Hamermesh ◽  
Jay Stewart

We examine monthly variation in weekly work hours using data from 2003 to 2010. The data sources include the Current Population Survey (CPS) on hours/worker, the Current Employment Survey (CES) on hours/job, and the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) on both. The ATUS data minimize recall difficulties and constrain hours of work to accord with total available time. The ATUS hours/worker are less cyclical than the CPS series, but the hours/job are more cyclical than the CES series. We present alternative estimates of productivity based on ATUS data, and find that it is more pro-cyclical than other productivity measures.

2013 ◽  
Vol 103 (5) ◽  
pp. 1664-1696 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Aguiar ◽  
Erik Hurst ◽  
Loukas Karabarbounis

Using data from the American Time Use Survey between 2003 and 2010, we document that home production absorbs roughly 30 percent of foregone market work hours at business cycle frequencies. Leisure absorbs roughly 50 percent of foregone market work hours, with sleeping and television watching accounting for most of this increase. We document significant increases in time spent on shopping, child care, education, and health. Job search absorbs between 2 and 6 percent of foregone market work hours. We discuss the implications of our results for business cycle models with home production and non-separable preferences. (JEL D31, E32, J22)


2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 231-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristine L. West

Researchers have good data on teachers' annual salaries but a hazy understanding of teachers’ hours of work. This makes it difficult to calculate an accurate hourly wage and leads policy makers to default to anecdote rather than fact when debating teacher pay. Using data from the American Time Use Survey, I find that teachers work an average of 34.5 hours per week on an annual basis (38.0 hours per week during the school year and 21.5 hours per week during the summer months). I find that when hours per week are accurately accounted for high school teachers earn in the range of 7–14 percent less than demographically similar workers in other occupations. However, elementary, middle, and special education teachers earn higher wages than demographically similar workers in other occupations.


2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 789-813 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natasha Quadlin ◽  
Long Doan

How does place structure the gendered division of household labor? Because people’s living spaces and lifestyles differ dramatically across urban, suburban, and rural areas, it follows that time spent on household chores may vary across places. In cities, for example, many households do not have vehicles or lawns, and housing units tend to be relatively small. Urban men’s and women’s time use therefore provides insight into how partners contribute to household chores when there is less structural demand for the types of tasks they typically do. We examine these dynamics using data on heterosexual married individuals from the American Time Use Survey combined with the Current Population Survey. We find that urban men spend relatively little time on male-typed chores, but they spend the same amount of time on female-typed chores as their suburban and rural counterparts. This pattern suggests that urban men do not “step up” their involvement in female-typed tasks even though they contribute little in the way of other housework. In contrast, urbanicity rarely predicts women’s time use, implying that women spend considerable time on household chores regardless of where they live. Implications for research on gender and housework are discussed.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 237802312098564
Author(s):  
Tim Futing Liao

Using social comparison theory, I investigate the relation between experienced happiness and income inequality. In the analysis, I study happiness effects of the individual-level within-gender-ethnicity comparison-based Gini index conditional on a state’s overall inequality, using a linked set of the March 2013 Current Population Survey and the 2013 American Time Use Survey data while controlling major potential confounders. The findings suggest that individuals who are positioned to conduct both upward and downward comparison would feel happier in states where overall income inequality is high. In states where inequality is not high, however, such effects are not present because social comparison becomes less meaningful when one’s position is not as clearly definable. Therefore, social comparison matters where inequality persists: One’s comparison with all similar others’ in the income distribution in a social environment determines the effect of one’s income on happiness, with the comparison target being the same gender-ethnic group.


2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 184-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Ignacio Giménez-Nadal ◽  
José Alberto Molina ◽  
Jorge Velilla

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze the time-allocation decisions of individuals who work from home (i.e. teleworkers), and compare them with their commuter counterparts. Design/methodology/approach Using data from the American Time Use Survey for the years 2003–2015, the authors analyze the time spent working, and the timing of work, of both commuters and teleworkers. Findings Results show that teleworkers devote 40 percent less time to market work activities than do commuters, and less than 60 percent of teleworkers work at “regular hours,” vs around 80 percent of their commuter counterparts. Using information from the Well-being Module for the years 2012 and 2013, the authors find that male teleworkers experience lower levels of negative feelings while working than do commuters. Originality/value This paper addresses the timing of work of workers working from home; and the instant well-being experienced, exploiting information at diary level.


2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 581-586 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catrine Tudor-Locke ◽  
Barbara E. Ainsworth ◽  
Tracy L. Washington ◽  
Richard Troiano

Background:The Current Population Survey (CPS) and the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) use the 2002 census occupation system to classify workers into 509 separate occupations arranged into 22 major occupational categories.Methods:We describe the methods and rationale for assigning detailed Metabolic Equivalent (MET) estimates to occupations and present population estimates (comparing outputs generated by analysis of previously published summary MET estimates to the detailed MET estimates) of intensities of occupational activity using the 2003 ATUS data comprised of 20,720 respondents, 5323 (2917 males and 2406 females) of whom reported working 6+ hours at their primary occupation on their assigned reporting day.Results:Analysis using the summary MET estimates resulted in 4% more workers in sedentary occupations, 6% more in light, 7% less in moderate, and 3% less in vigorous compared with using the detailed MET estimates. The detailed estimates are more sensitive to identifying individuals who do any occupational activity that is moderate or vigorous in intensity resulting in fewer workers in sedentary and light intensity occupations.Conclusions:Since CPS/ATUS regularly captures occupation data it will be possible to track prevalence of the different intensity levels of occupations. Updates will be required with inevitable adjustments to future occupational classification systems.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1097184X2110149
Author(s):  
Daniel L. Carlson ◽  
Richard J. Petts ◽  
Joanna R. Pepin

Prior studies that show no association between fathers’ work flexibility and their domestic contributions suffer from measurement limitations and/or the lack of nationally representative data. Using data on fathers in different-sex partnerships (n = 1,956) from the 2017–2018 American Time Use Survey Leave Module, we examine three indicators (use, frequency of use and reason for use) of working from home—a work–family benefit is known as flexplace—and consider whether partners’ employment status moderates the association between flexplace and fathers’ time in domestic labor. Fathers who use flexplace benefits report more routine childcare, regardless of the reason for flexplace use or their partners’ employment status. The association between flexplace use and fathers’ housework time is conditional on their partners’ employment status and fathers’ rationale for working from home.


Author(s):  
Michael Osei Mireku ◽  
Alina Rodriguez

The objective was to investigate the association between time spent on waking activities and nonaligned sleep duration in a representative sample of the US population. We analysed time use data from the American Time Use Survey (ATUS), 2015–2017 (N = 31,621). National Sleep Foundation (NSF) age-specific sleep recommendations were used to define recommended (aligned) sleep duration. The balanced, repeated, replicate variance estimation method was applied to the ATUS data to calculate weighted estimates. Less than half of the US population had a sleep duration that mapped onto the NSF recommendations, and alignment was higher on weekdays (45%) than at weekends (33%). The proportion sleeping longer than the recommended duration was higher than those sleeping shorter on both weekdays and weekends (p < 0.001). Time spent on work, personal care, socialising, travel, TV watching, education, and total screen time was associated with nonalignment to the sleep recommendations. In comparison to the appropriate recommended sleep group, those with a too-short sleep duration spent more time on work, travel, socialising, relaxing, and leisure. By contrast, those who slept too long spent relatively less time on each of these activities. The findings indicate that sleep duration among the US population does not map onto the NSF sleep recommendations, mostly because of a higher proportion of long sleepers compared to short sleepers. More time spent on work, travel, and socialising and relaxing activities is strongly associated with an increased risk of nonalignment to NSF sleep duration recommendations.


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