IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cep/cepdps/dp1467.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Parental sleep and employment: evidence from a British cohort study

Author

Listed:
  • Joan Costa-Font
  • Sarah Flèche

Abstract

We show that sleep deprivation exerts a strong negative effect on labour market performance. We exploit variations in child sleep quality to instrument for parental sleep quality. A one-hour reduction in sleep duration significantly decreases labour force participation, the number of hours worked and household income. In addition, we find that low-skilled mothers are more likely to opt out of the labour market and work less hours than high-skilled mothers when exposed to sleep deprivation. We argue that sleep is a major determinant of employment outcomes that needs more attention in designing economic models of time allocation and employment policies.

Suggested Citation

  • Joan Costa-Font & Sarah Flèche, 2017. "Parental sleep and employment: evidence from a British cohort study," CEP Discussion Papers dp1467, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
  • Handle: RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1467
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1467.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lisa A. Kramer & Mark J. Kamstra & Maurice D. Levi, 2000. "Losing Sleep at the Market: The Daylight Saving Anomaly," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 1005-1011, September.
    2. Szalontai, Gabor, 2006. "The demand for sleep: A South African study," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 854-874, September.
    3. Antillón, Marina & Lauderdale, Diane S. & Mullahy, John, 2014. "Sleep behavior and unemployment conditions," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 14(C), pages 22-32.
    4. Biddle, Jeff E & Hamermesh, Daniel S, 1990. "Sleep and the Allocation of Time," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 922-943, October.
    5. Gibson, Matthew & Shrader, Jeffrey, 2014. "Time Use and Productivity: The Wage Returns to Sleep," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt8zp518hc, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
    6. Pierre Brochu & Catherine Armstrong & Louis-Philippe Morin, 2012. "The ‘trendiness’ of sleep: an empirical investigation into the cyclical nature of sleep time," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 43(2), pages 891-913, October.
    7. Jerome M. Siegel, 2005. "Clues to the functions of mammalian sleep," Nature, Nature, vol. 437(7063), pages 1264-1271, October.
    8. Jens Bonke, 2012. "Do Morning-Type People Earn More than Evening-Type People? How Chronotypes Influence Income," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 105-106, pages 55-72.
    9. Michael Grossman, 1972. "The Demand for Health: A Theoretical and Empirical Investigation," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number gros72-1.
    10. repec:adr:anecst:y:2012:i:105-106:p:4 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Arber, Sara & Bote, Marcos & Meadows, Robert, 2009. "Gender and socio-economic patterning of self-reported sleep problems in Britain," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 281-289, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jeremy Clark & David L. Dickinson, 2017. "The Impact of Sleep Restriction on Contributions and Punishment: First Evidence," Working Papers 17-04, Department of Economics, Appalachian State University.
    2. Jeremy Clark & David L Dickinson, 2020. "The effect of sleep on public good contributions and punishment: Experimental evidence," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(10), pages 1-26, October.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Joan Costa-Font & Sarah Flèche, 2018. "Child Sleep and Maternal Labour Market Outcomes [Discussion Paper Series]," Working Papers halshs-03204629, HAL.
    2. Costa-Font, Joan & Flèche, Sarah, 2020. "Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    3. Joan Costa-Font & Sarah Flèche, 2018. "Child Sleep and Maternal Labour Market Outcomes [Discussion Paper Series]," Working Papers halshs-03204629, HAL.
    4. Costa-Font, Joan & Fleche, Sarah & Pagan, Ricardo, 2024. "The labour market returns to sleep," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    5. Sedigh, Golnaz & Devlin, Rose Anne & Grenier, Gilles & Deri Armstrong, Catherine, 2017. "Revisiting the relationship between wages and sleep duration: The role of insomnia," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 125-139.
    6. Giuntella, Osea & Mazzonna, Fabrizio, 2016. "If You Don't Snooze You Lose: Evidence on Health and Weight," IZA Discussion Papers 9773, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Christian Pfeifer, 2015. "UnfairWage Perceptions and Sleep: Evidence from German Survey Data," Schmollers Jahrbuch : Journal of Applied Social Science Studies / Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 135(4), pages 413-428.
    8. Osea Giuntella & Wei Han & Fabrizio Mazzonna, 2017. "Circadian Rhythms, Sleep, and Cognitive Skills: Evidence From an Unsleeping Giant," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 54(5), pages 1715-1742, October.
    9. Bishop, James, 2015. "No Rest for the Weary: Commuting, Hours Worked, and Sleep," MPRA Paper 62162, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Gibson, Matthew & Shrader, Jeffrey, 2014. "Time Use and Productivity: The Wage Returns to Sleep," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt8zp518hc, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
    11. Christian Pfeifer, 2018. "An Empirical Note On Commuting Distance And Sleep During Workweek And Weekend," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(1), pages 97-102, January.
    12. Jara-Díaz, Sergio R. & Rosales-Salas, Jorge, 2020. "Time use: The role of sleep," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 1-20.
    13. Akay, Alpaslan & Martinsson, Peter & Ralsmark, Hilda, 2019. "Relative concerns and sleep behavior," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 1-14.
    14. Jin, L. & Ziebarth, N.R., 2015. "Sleep and Human Capital: Evidence from Daylight Saving Time," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 15/27, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    15. Alan T. Piper, 2016. "Sleep duration and life satisfaction," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 63(4), pages 305-325, December.
    16. Tinna Laufey Ásgeirsdóttir & Sigurður Páll Ólafsson & Gylfi Zoega, 2016. "Sleep and the management of alertness," Mind & Society: Cognitive Studies in Economics and Social Sciences, Springer;Fondazione Rosselli, vol. 15(2), pages 169-189, November.
    17. Kajitani, Shinya, 2021. "The return of sleep," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    18. Pierre Brochu & Catherine Armstrong & Louis-Philippe Morin, 2012. "The ‘trendiness’ of sleep: an empirical investigation into the cyclical nature of sleep time," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 43(2), pages 891-913, October.
    19. Cardon, James H. & Eide, Eric R. & Phillips, Kerk L. & Showalter, Mark H., 2018. "A model of sleep, leisure and work over the business cycle," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 19-36.
    20. Billari, Francesco C. & Giuntella, Osea & Stella, Luca, 2018. "Broadband internet, digital temptations, and sleep," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 58-76.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    child sleep; sleep; maternal employment; working hours; job satisfaction; ALSPAC;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • J28 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Safety; Job Satisfaction; Related Public Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1467. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/publications/discussion-papers/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.