Telework, Wages, and Time Use in the United States

Remote work is rapidly increasing in the US. Using data on full-time wage and salary workers from the GHIJ-GHIL American Time Use Survey Leave and Job Flexibilities Module, we estimate hourly wage differentials between teleworkers and office workers and compare how teleworkers and office workers allocate their time on office days and work-at-home days. Using an econometric method that relates selection on observables with selection on unobservables, we find that some teleworkers earn a wage premium, but it varies by occupation, gender, parental status, and teleworking intensity. In all subsamples, male, but not female, home-based teleworkers earn a wage premium. Among occasional teleworkers, we find a wage premium for all subsamples with the exception of mothers and men without children. Using time diaries, we find that teleworkers spend less time on commuting and grooming activities but more time on leisure and household production activities and more time with family on work-at-home days than office days. We do not find differences in workers' hours on average by telework status, but male teleworkers regardless of their work location on their diary day work slightly fewer minutes on weekday workdays than office workers.