American Economic Journal:
Macroeconomics
ISSN 1945-7707 (Print) | ISSN 1945-7715 (Online)
A Century of Work and Leisure
American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics
(pp. 189–224)
Abstract
We develop comprehensive measures of time spent in market work, home production, schooling, and leisure in the United States for the last 106 years. We find that hours of work for prime age individuals are essentially unchanged, with the rise in women's hours fully compensating for the decline in men's hours. Hours worked by those 14 to 24 years old have declined noticeably, but most of this decline was offset by a rise in hours spent in school. Overall, per capita leisure and average annual lifetime leisure increased by only four or five hours per week during the last 100 years. (JEL D13, J16, J22)Citation
Ramey, Valerie A., and Neville Francis. 2009. "A Century of Work and Leisure." American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 1 (2): 189–224. DOI: 10.1257/mac.1.2.189Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D13 Household Production and Intrahousehold Allocation
- J16 Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
- J22 Time Allocation and Labor Supply