A study of time allocation of Japanese households

Abstract

In this study, we compare the patterns of time allocation of the young (age 25–39) and the elderly (age 65 or above), the employed and the unemployed, male and female Japanese households. We examine how economic rationality and the Japanese culture play their roles in determining the patterns of time allocations. Views are proposed that (1) the persisting male–female gap in the non-market domestic working hours observed in Japan is better explained by the Japanese culture than the Japanese tax system or male–female wage differential, (2) the relatively low wage-elasticity of labor supply of Japanese young males is an indication of the fact that young males enjoy considerable amount of on-the-job leisure. Further, we observe that (3) the life-cycle pattern of time allocation to sleep (and other time use for health care) is of the U-type so that the elderly invest more time on health care than the young, (4) sleeping time decreased in 1986 as compared to 1976 in Japan which might be due to the improvement of medical technology, and (5) contrary to US experience, higher wages are associated with longer hours of sleep for the Japanese young. The Appendix Aprovides a restrictive time-allocation model with special reference to time use for health care which provides theoretical support for empirical findings.