The great recession and unpaid work time in the United States – Does poverty matter?

Abstract

Using the 2003–12 American Time Use Survey, this paper establishes the presence of poverty-based differences in the changes in household production time of men and women during the Great Recession, contributing to our understanding of the heterogeneous impact of recession on the well-being of individuals. We find that poor men’s unpaid work time increased whereas nonpoor men’s unpaid work time decreased. Among women, only nonpoor women reduced their unpaid work time. We examine the forces behind these changes using the Oaxaca-Blinder decompositions. The decompositions reveal that poverty-based differences can be partially attributed to shifts in the structure of households whereas gender-based differences to shifts in own and spousal employment status. Nevertheless, sizable portions of the changes in unpaid work time remain unexplained by the shifting individual and household characteristics. The analysis of the unexplained portion of the changes supports the assertion that poverty matters to the adjustments in unpaid work time.