Time-use Surveys Research Articles

Leisure and Social Capital: An Analysis of Types of Company and Activities

The relation between leisure activities and social capital is examined in this paper. The focus is on two dimensions: the company in which the activities were performed (household members versus friends and acquaintances) and the nature of the activities (productive versus consumptive). Data are employed from a time-use survey conducted in the United Kingdom in 2000. Productive activities are positively related to the social capital indicators of civic engagement and helping, while consumptive activities are not. The type of activity matters more than the type of company. Leisure activities especially further people's social capital among groups that are already gifted with high levels of civic engagement and helping.

Characteristics of Individual Lifestyles of Males and Females in Urban Areas in Thailand as Indicated by a Time-Use Survey

Characteristics of Individual Lifestyles of Males and Females in Urban Areas in Thailand as Indicated by a Time-Use Survey

Effects of Physical Activity on Propensity for Sustainable Trips

Recent statistics about the low level of participation by individuals in physical activities as well as a generalized propensity to use private vehicles have broadened the scope of transport studies to the sphere of health and well-being. The current shift in travel demand modeling to the activity-based paradigm is central to investigating which population segment is more likely to opt for environmentally friendly and energy-efficient vehicles, alternative modes of transport, and a rational use of the motor car. A mixed, joint Tobit–probit model analyzes the effects of time allocation for daily activity on the propensity to sustainable trips. The model is applied to a sample of workers and students age 14 and older, drawn from a time-use survey conducted in Turin, Italy, and its metropolitan area. The analysis suggests the presence of self-selection effects between active lifestyles and sustainable mandatory trips. The model predictions highlight the substantial contribution of transportation interventions in getting individuals to engage in healthier behaviors.

It’s Time to “Do Economics” with Time-Use Data

Time-use data are old and familiar in survey research, with the first rudimentary efforts going back nearly a century; and large-scale regularly collected data sets have been available in other countries (e.g., Germany, France) since 1965. It is only with the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) since 2003, however, that the US has moved from the derri?re to the avant garde of data quality and quantity in the area of time-use surveys. With a large fraction of the economics profession resident in the US, and with American scholarly economics journals being the most prestigious outlets for economists worldwide, the advent of these data and the wider availability of similar, albeit smaller and/or irregular time-use surveys from other countries present economists with exciting opportunities. The difficulty with these data sets is that they offer us the temptation of the quick tabulation and the simple regression on items that economists have not previously dis cussed: It is very easy to present information on gender differences in time spent in various categories of home production, leisure and personal maintenance and to adjust these for a wide array of other demographic characteristics. It is simple to examine how employment status is correlated with the kinds of non-market activities that people undertake, and even to study how one's spouse's employment status relates to one's non-market activities. Economists can do these calculations, we have done them and, no doubt will continue to produce this kind of research. But where is the economics? What do we have to offer here that could not be done at least as well by sociologists? Unless economists think like economists?use economic theory to model behavior related to time use, discover facts that might alter our theories, and generate predictions derived from those modified theories, we have nothing special to offer in this area. Economists should leave demographic accounting of time use to folks in other disci plines?they may have an absolute advantage in such research, and we certainly lack a comparative advantage in it. What subjects can we as economists study with these data? A by no means exhaustive list of research areas, in some of which a few early studies have already been generated, might include:

Using Time-Use Data to Parameterize Models for the Spread of Close-Contact Infectious Diseases

Social contact patterns are a critical explanatory factor of the spread of close-contact infectious agents. Both indirect (via observed epidemiologic data) and direct (via diaries that record at-risk events) approaches to the measurement of contacts by age have been proposed in the literature. In this paper, the authors discuss the possibilities offered by time-use surveys to measure contact patterns and to explain observed seroprevalence profiles. The authors first develop a methodology to estimate time-of-exposure matrices, and then they apply it to time-use data for the United States (1987-2003). Finally, the authors estimate age-specific transmission parameters for varicella, commonly known as "chickenpox," from age-specific time-of-exposure and seroprevalence data (United States, 1988-1994). The estimated time-of-exposure matrix reveals a strong element of assortativeness by age. In addition, there are peaks of exposure between people who were born one generation apart (i.e., parents and their children). Models based on the estimated age-specific transmission parameters fit the observed patterns of infection of endemically circulating varicella in a satisfactory way. The availability of time-use data for a large number of countries and their potential to supplement contact surveys make the methods developed extremely valuable and suitable for implementation in several different contexts.

How Do Parents Allocate Time?

This paper focuses on the time allocation of spouses and the impact of economic variables. We present a stylized model of the time allocation of spouses to illustrate the expected impact of wages and non-labour income. The empirical model simultaneously specifies three time-use choices -paid work, childcare, and housework- and wage and employment equations for each spouse, allowing for correlation across the errors of the ten equations. We exploit the rich information in the French time-use survey 1998-99 to estimate the model. The predictions of the theoretical model are mostly validated with the main exception of the standard hypothesis that performing housework does not bring utility. Parents' market time responds positively to changes in own wage. The own-wage elasticity of housework is negative while childcare does not react to changes in own wage. Women's non-market time is independent of their husband's wage; but both housework and childcare of fathers react positively to an increase in their wife's wage. Non-labour income reduces paid work by parents and increases their non-market time. Higher-educated and older parents spend more time with their children. There are significant and positive correlations across the errors of the spousal equations.

Off‐Scheduling within Dual‐Earner Couples: An Unequal and Negative Externality for Family Time

Using couples' time-diary data from two French time-use surveys (1986, 1999), this article explores the extent to which off-scheduling within dual-earner couples is an unequal and negative externality for family time. An empirical typology of family workdays is built using a variant of optimal matching, and three kinds of family time are taken into account: conjugal time, father- and mother-child time, and parents-child time. The results indicate that off-scheduling is an unintentional by-product of employers' economic interests and that, since it reduces conjugal and parents-child time but fails to foster temporal complementarity between parents, it is a negative factor for family solidarity.

The Distribution of Leisure Time Across Countries and Over Time

In this paper, we use time-use surveys to examine trends in the allocation of time in five industrialized countries over the last thirty years. Adjusting for changing demographics, we find that leisure time across countries has converged over this period. Specifically, leisure time has declined five to eight hours in countries with high leisure levels thirty years ago and has increased around one hour in the other countries. For men the reduction in leisure was driven by an increase in nonmarket work, while women dramatically increased time allocated to market work and decreased nonmarket work time. Lastly, we show that like in the USA leisure inequality increased in all countries of our sample.

Deficient Public Infrastructure and Private Costs: Evidence from a Time-Use Survey for the Water Sector in India

This paper presents new evidence on the links between public-infrastructure provisioning and time allocation related to the water sector in India. An analysis of time-use data reveals that worsening public infrastructure affects market work, with evident gender differentials. The results also suggest that access to public infrastructure can lead to substitution effects in time allocation between unpaid work and market work. The broad conclusion of the paper is that public-investment policy can redress intrahousehold inequalities, in terms of labor-supply decisions, by supporting initiatives that reduce the allocation of time in nonmarket work.

Explorations: Time-use surveys in the south

Time-use surveys show how individuals spend their time during the day or week, which provides evidence of the gendered division of labor within households and the interdependence of women's and men's paid and unpaid work. Time-use experts in the South face similar challenges to those working in other countries, but they also have to come to terms with the restrictions faced in less developed contexts – notably higher illiteracy rates and limited statistical budgets. These Explorations bring together contributions from three experts on time-use survey design and administration working in three diverse Southern regions to highlight the ongoing processes of learning-by-doing and of building local expertise in these regions. Their discussion of methodological and logistical issues holds particular relevance for developing countries moving toward the implementation of time-use surveys. It also bears on more general feminist concerns regarding the classification and measurement of unpaid care.

Satisfaction with work-family balance for parents of early adolescents compared to parents of younger children

This paper explores aspects of how parents of young teenagers experience balancing work and family demands, compared to parents of younger children. It uses data from Waves 1 and 3 of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey and from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Time Use Survey (TUS) 1997. It assesses whether satisfaction with work-family balance differs for parents of adolescent children compared with parents of younger children, the extent to which parents of adolescents use non-parental child care, experience difficulty in finding child care or provide personal supervision of their children after school, and whether satisfaction with work-family balance of parents with adolescents is affected by access to family- friendly workplace measures.

The Coming of the 24-hour Economy?

This study mapped the changes in the timing of working hours in Belgium as reported in workers' daily work schedules, obtained from the Belgian Time-Use Surveys of 1966 and 1999. A typology of working schedules was drawn up by means of a sequence analysis. This approach showed that work performed beyond the standard times, that is, in the evening, at night, or on weekends, did not grow in importance in the intervening years. In 1999, standard working hours clearly accounted for a larger share of the work schedules of the active population. Although the analyses did certainly not corroborate the often alleged trend towards a 24-hour society in Belgium, it could be shown that certain categories of the working population are more susceptible to flexible working hours than others.

The characteristic of Indonesian life style with the time-use survey

The characteristic of Indonesian life style with the time-use survey

How Do Parents Allocate Time? The Effects of Wages and Income

This paper focuses on the time allocation of spouses and the impact of economic variables. We present a stylized model of the time allocation of spouses to illustrate the expected impact of wages and non-labour income. The empirical model simultaneously specifies three time-use choices - paid work, childcare, and housework - and wage and employment equations for each spouse, allowing for correlation across the errors of the ten equations. We exploit the rich information in the French time-use survey 1998-99 to estimate the model. The predictions of the theoretical model are mostly validated with the main exception of the standard hypothesis that performing housework does not bring utility. Parents' market time responds positively to changes in own wage. The own-wage elasticity of housework is negative while childcare does not react to changes in own wage. Women's non-market time is independent of their husband's wage; but both housework and childcare of fathers react positively to an increase in their wife's wage. Non-labour income reduces paid work by parents and increases their non-market time. Higher-educated and older parents spend more time with their children. There are significant and positive correlations across the errors of the spousal equations.

Red Thread: the politics of hope in Guyana

Reflecting on the work of the Red Thread Women's Development Organisation in Guyana, which has over two decades' worth of experience in grassroots organising, the author explores what autonomy and connection might mean for poor women. Forging a multiracial unity, while confronting and working through disparities in power among women, is regarded as integral to the struggle for freedom. Initiatives undertaken by Red Thread, such as a time-use survey which allowed women to define and make visible their work, are located within a wider notion of transnational solidarity and mutual support.

The Right to a Job, the Right Types of Projects: Employment Guarantee Policies from a Gender Perspective

There is now widespread recognition that in most countries, private-sector investment has not been able to absorb surplus labor. This is all the more the case for poor unskilled people. Public works programs and employment guarantee schemes in South Africa, India, and other countries provide jobs while creating public assets. In addition to physical infrastructure, an area that has immense potential to create much-needed jobs is that of social service delivery and social infrastructure. While unemployment and enforced idleness persist, existing time-use survey data reveal that people around the world - especially women and children - spend long hours performing unpaid work. This work includes not only household maintenance and care provisioning for family members and communities, but also time spent that helps fill public infrastructural gaps - for example, in the energy, health, and education sectors. This paper suggests that, by bringing together public job creation, on the one hand, and unpaid work, on the other, well-designed employment guarantee policies can promote job creation, gender equality, and pro-poor development.

Is there Really a Second Shift, and if so, who does it? A Time-Diary Investigation

This paper draws on data from the most recent Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Time Use Survey ( TUS) (over 4,000 randomly selected households) to tease out the dimensions of the ‘second shift’. Predictions that as women entered the paid workforce men would contribute more to household labour have largely failed to eventuate. This underpins the view that women are working a second shift because they are shouldering a dual burden of paid and unpaid work. However, time use research seems to show that when both paid and unpaid work is counted, male and female workloads are in total very similar. This has led to suggestions that a literal second shift is a myth; that it exists in the sense that women do more domestic work than men, but not in the sense that they work longer hours in total. Using a more accurate and telling measure of workload than previous research (paid and unpaid labour including multitasked activities), this paper explores the second shift and how it relates to family configuration, ethnicity and indicators of class and socioeconomic standing. It finds a clear disparity between the total workloads of mothers and fathers, much of which consists of simultaneous (secondary) activity, and some demographic differences in female (but not male) total workloads. It concludes that the view that the second shift is a myth is only sustainable by averaging social groups very broadly and by excluding multitasking from the measurement of total work activity.

What is child care? Lessons from time-use surveys of major English-speaking countries

This paper examines the definition and measurement of time devoted to child care in the diary-based surveys administered by the United States, Canada, Australia, and Great Britain. Detailed analysis of the relationship between measures of care activity and supervisory care in the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) illustrate the larger conceptual issues at stake.

Time away from “smelling the roses”: Where do mothers raising children with disabilities find the time to work?

Using the Australian Time Use survey (TUS), this study examined time allocation among working parents raising children with disabilities. Findings showed that raising children with disabilities reduced the time working mothers had for leisure activities, but increased the time for socializing activities. Consistent with the literature, the latter effect probably reflects the special need of working mothers raising children with disabilities for strong social networks offering regular support. While a mother's time for personal care was reduced by a child with a disability, a father's time for personal care was unaffected. Thus, mothers were relatively more disadvantaged than fathers in terms of total time for themselves. This study offers new knowledge on the impact of childhood disability on working parents’ time for personal care and leisure, activities that can improve their psychological and physical well-being.

A Model of the Dynamic Process of Time Allocation to Discretionary Activities

This paper proposes an activity-based methodology for representing the allocation of time to discretionary activities during their programming and scheduling, based on the premise that both phases are to be considered contextually and two aspects of the same decision process. The aim of this work is to extend the treatment of utility maximization associated with carrying out two activities to J activities, so as to be able to segregate the time spent traveling from the total amount of time dedicated to out-of-home activities. The global structure of the model takes the form of a nested Tobit, particularly suited for reproducing a sequence of coupled choices. The first choice concerns dividing up overall discretionary time between activities inside and outside the home, then the second choice, subordinate to the first, involves rebudgeting the time between in- and out-of-home activities and trips. Thus the proposed model enables us to analyze the effects that each explicative variable exerts on trips segregated from activities outside the home and, last, during demand forecasting, the direct consequences of allocating discretionary time to trips following changes to an individual’s time budget. A database created from a large-scale time-use survey (ISTAT 1988–1991) has been used for calibrating the model coefficients.