IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp1720.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Existence and Persistence of Long Work Hours

Author

Listed:
  • Drago, Robert

    (Pennsylvania State University)

  • Black, David

    (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research)

  • Wooden, Mark

    (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research)

Abstract

Previous research hypothesizes that long working hours are related to consumerism, the ideal worker norm, high levels of human capital, and a high cost-of-job-loss. The authors test these hypotheses using panel data on working hours for an Australian sample of full-time employed workers. Analyses include a static cross-sectional model and a persistence model for long hours over time. The results suggest that long hours (50 or more hours in a usual week) are often persistent, and provide strongest support for the consumerism hypothesis, with some support for the ideal worker norm and human capital hypotheses, and no support for the cost-of-job-loss hypothesis. Other results are consistent with a backward-bending supply of long hours, and with multiple job holders and the self-employed working long hours.

Suggested Citation

  • Drago, Robert & Black, David & Wooden, Mark, 2005. "The Existence and Persistence of Long Work Hours," IZA Discussion Papers 1720, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1720
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp1720.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nicole Watson & Mark Wooden, 2004. "The HILDA Survey Four Years On," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 37(3), pages 343-349, September.
    2. Bowles, Samuel, 1985. "The Production Process in a Competitive Economy: Walrasian, Neo-Hobbesian, and Marxian Models," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(1), pages 16-36, March.
    3. Peter Berg & Eileen Appelbaum & Tom Bailey & Arne L. Kalleberg, 2004. "Contesting Time: International Comparisons of Employee Control of Working Time," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 57(3), pages 331-349, April.
    4. Joachim Merz, 1993. "Market and Non-market Labor Supply and Recent German Tax Reform Impacts - Behavioral Response in a Combined Dynamic and Static Microsimulation Model," FFB-Discussionpaper 06, Research Institute on Professions (Forschungsinstitut Freie Berufe (FFB)), LEUPHANA University Lüneburg.
    5. Anne Hawke & Mark Wooden, 1998. "The Changing Face of Australian Industrial Relations: A Survey," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 74(224), pages 74-88, March.
    6. Landers, Renee M & Rebitzer, James B & Taylor, Lowell J, 1996. "Rat Race Redux: Adverse Selection in the Determination of Work Hours in Law Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(3), pages 329-348, June.
    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. Lonnie Golden & Barbara Wiens-Tuers, 2008. "Overtime Work and Wellbeing at Home," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 66(1), pages 25-49.
    2. Yuka Fujimoto & Fara Azmat & Charmine E.J. Härtel, 2013. "Gender perceptions of work-life balance: management implications for full-time employees in Australia," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 38(1), pages 147-170, April.
    3. Heywood, John S. & Siebert, W. Stanley & Wei, Xiangdong, 2005. "High Performance Workplaces and Family Friendly Practices: Promises Made and Promises Kept," IZA Discussion Papers 1812, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Lonnie Golden, 2009. "A Brief History of Long Work Time and the Contemporary Sources of Overwork," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 84(2), pages 217-227, January.
    5. Renate Ortlieb & Julian Winterheller, 2020. "Behind Migrant and Non‐Migrant Worktime Inequality in Europe: Institutional and Cultural Factors Explaining Differences," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 58(4), pages 785-815, December.
    6. Mevlut Tatliyer & Nurullah Gur, 2022. "Individualism and Working Hours: Macro-Level Evidence," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 733-755, January.
    7. Anne Bustreel & Martine Pernod-Lemattre, 2021. "The working-time regime of the “ideal worker” in high-skilled occupations [Le régime temporel du « travailleur idéal » dans les professions hautement qualifiées]," Post-Print hal-03474261, HAL.

    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. Robert Drago & David Black & Mark Wooden, 2005. "The Persistence of Long Work Hours," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2005n12, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    2. Robert Drago & Mark Wooden & David Black, 2009. "Long Work Hours: Volunteers and Conscripts," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 47(3), pages 571-600, September.
    3. Dragoș Adăscăliței & Jason Heyes & Pedro Mendonça, 2022. "The intensification of work in Europe: A multilevel analysis," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 60(2), pages 324-347, June.
    4. Carr, Michael D., 2011. "Work hours and wage inequality: Evidence from the 2004 WERS," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 417-427, August.
    5. Dow,Gregory K., 2019. "The Labor-Managed Firm," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107589650.
    6. Rebitzer, James B. & Taylor, Lowell J., 2011. "Extrinsic Rewards and Intrinsic Motives: Standard and Behavioral Approaches to Agency and Labor Markets," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 8, pages 701-772, Elsevier.
    7. Robert Drago & David Black & Mark Wooden, 2006. "Who Wants Flexibility? Changing Work Hours Preferences and Life Events," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2006n19, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    8. Alison L. Booth, 2006. "The Glass Ceiling in Europe: Why Are Women Doing Badly in the Labour Market?," CEPR Discussion Papers 542, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    9. Boyer, Robert, 1992. "La crise de la macroéconomie, une conséquence de la méconnaissance des institutions?," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 68(1), pages 43-68, mars et j.
    10. Anger, Silke, 2005. "Unpaid Overtime in Germany: Differences between East and West," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 125(1), pages 17-27.
    11. Dora Gicheva, 2020. "Occupational Social Value and Returns to Long Hours," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 87(347), pages 682-712, July.
    12. Frisvold, George B., 2005. "Transaction Costs and Institutional Innovations in Agricultural Labor Contracts," 2005 Annual meeting, July 24-27, Providence, RI 19495, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    13. Della Giusta, Marina & Jewell, Sarah, 2021. "Working for Nothing: Personality and Time Allocation in the UK," IZA Discussion Papers 14971, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. Janet Walsh, 1993. "Internalization v. Decentralization: An Analysis of Recent Developments in Pay Bargaining," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 31(3), pages 409-432, September.
    15. Ina Ganguli & Ricardo Hausmann & Martina Viarengo, 2021. "Gender Differences in Professional Career Dynamics: New Evidence from a Global Law Firm," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(349), pages 105-128, January.
    16. Petrick, Martin, 2018. "A microeconomic model of worker motivation based on monetary and non-monetary incentives," IAMO Discussion Papers 274821, Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO).
    17. Derek Bosworth & Joanne Loundes, 2002. "The Dynamic Performance of Australian Enterprises," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2002n03, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    18. Spencer, David A, 2000. "The Demise of Radical Political Economics? An Essay on the Evolution of a Theory of Capitalist Production," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 24(5), pages 543-564, September.
    19. Carter, Michael R. & Zimmerman, Frederick J., 2000. "The dynamic cost and persistence of asset inequality in an agrarian economy," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 265-302, December.
    20. Max Albert & Jürgen Meckl, 2003. "Involuntary Unemployment and the Existence of GDP Functions," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(1), pages 79-88, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    working hours; overwork; HILDA Survey;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

    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:iza:izadps:dp1720. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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.