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Togetherness: Spouses' Synchronous Leisure, and the Impact of Children

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Daniel S. Hamermesh

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Abstract

This study goes beyond the immense literature on the quantity of labor that households supply to examine the timing of their labor/leisure choices. Using two-year panels from the United States in the 1970s it demonstrates that couples prefer to consume leisure simultaneously: Synchronization is greater than random male-female pairing would predict. In the 1970s the demand for joint leisure among working couples was more responsive to increases in wives' earnings than to husbands', but by the 1990s the responses were identical. Couples react to changes in constraints on them by altering their schedules to preserve joint leisure, and those with higher full incomes consume more of their leisure jointly. Children reduce the jointness of spouses' leisure, with the greatest change in schedules occurring among new mothers.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 7455.

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Date of creation: Jan 2000
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:7455

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Jacob Mincer, 1962. "Labor Force Participation of Married Women," NBER Chapters, in: Aspects of Labor Economics, pages 63-106 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
  2. Blau, David M, 1998. "Labor Force Dynamics of Older Married Couples," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(3), pages 595-629, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Thomas, D., 1995. "Like Father, Like Son, Like Mother, Like Daughter, Parental Resources and Child Height," Papers 95-01, RAND - Reprint Series.
  4. Zweimuller, Josef & Winter-Ebmer, Rudolf & Falkinger, Josef, 1996. "Retirement of spouses and social security reform," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 449-472, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. Hilary Hoynes, 1993. "Welfare Transfers in Two-Parent Families: Labor Supply and Welfare Participation Under AFDC-UP," NBER Working Papers 4407, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Killingsworth, Mark R. & Heckman, James J., 1987. "Female labor supply: A survey," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & R. Layard (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 2, pages 103-204 Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Lundberg, Shelly J, 1988. "Labor Supply of Husbands and Wives: A Simultaneous Equations Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 70(2), pages 224-35, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Kostiuk, Peter F, 1990. "Compensating Differentials for Shift Work," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 1054-75, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Kristian Orsini & Amedeo Spadaro, 2005. "Sharing resources within the household: a multi-country microsimulation analysis of the determinants of intrahousehold "strategic weight" differentials and their distributional outcomes," PSE Working Papers 2005-04, PSE (Ecole normale supérieure). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Chris van Klaveren & Bernard M.S. van Praag & Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink, 2005. "Empirical Estimation Results of a Collective Household Time Allocation Model," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 05-096/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 06 Apr 2006. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  3. Van Klaveren, Chris & Maassen van den Brink, Henriette & Van Praag, Bernard, 2006. "The influence of work time adjustment on joint activities and the demand for child care," MPRA Paper 1213, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
  4. Hallberg, Daniel, 2002. "Synchronous Leisure, Jointness and Household Labor Supply," Working Paper Series 2002:11, Uppsala University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. repec:ese:iserwp: is not listed on IDEAS
  6. Nancy Folbre & Jayoung Yoon & Kade Finnoff & Allison Sidle Fuligni, 2004. "By What Measure? Family Time Devoted to Children in the U.S," Working Papers 2004-06, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  7. Shelly Lundberg & Elaina Rose, 1998. "The Determinants of Specialization Within Marriage," Discussion Papers in Economics at the University of Washington 0048, Department of Economics at the University of Washington. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  8. Chris van Klaveren & Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink, 2005. "Intra-household Work Time Synchronization: Togetherness or Material Benefits?," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 05-095/3, Tinbergen Institute. [Downloadable!]
  9. Chris van Klaveren & Henriette Maassen van den Brink, 2005. "Intra-household Work Time Synchronization," Labor and Demography 0504005, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
  10. Rachel Connelly & Jean Kimmel, 2007. "Spousal Influences on Parents’ Non-Market Time Choices," IZA Discussion Papers 2894, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
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