Multiple Worker Households and Multiple Job Holding: Rigid Vs. Flexible Hours

The paper examines a household production model in which there are two potential wage earners. One of the workers has two job possibilities. His or her higher paying job requires the worker to work a pre-determined, non-negotiable, number of hours. This job is a “Rigid Hours†job. The other jobs that may be taken by the household members allow the workers to optimally determine the number of hours worked. These jobs are “Flexible Hours†jobs. The paper examines the household's optimal response to the constraints imposed upon it by the rigid hours job, as well as the usual time and budget constraints. The interdependence of the household member's labor supply decisions is well established in the household production literature. Shisko and Rostker (“The Economics of Multiple Job Holding,†American Economic Review , 1976) provide a model of multiple job holding but do not consider a two person household or a complete set of time constraints. This paper will develop a framework for studying all of these disparate elements. The time allocations of “husband†and “wife†may seem paradoxical at first blush; a person may choose a lower paying job over a higher paying one; the “husband†may drop out of the labor force to be replaced by his lower paid “wife;†and the higher paid “husband†may do housework even though the marginal value of housework is less than the “wife's†wage. The key to these paradoxes in the time allocations of households is in the constraints.