The Expanding Workweek? Understanding Trends in Long Work Hours Among U.S. Men, 1979-2004
50 Pages Posted: 26 Jan 2006
There are 2 versions of this paper
The Expanding Workweek? Understanding Trends in Long Work Hours Among U.S. Men, 1979-2004
The Expanding Workweek? Understanding Trends in Long Work Hours Among U.S. Men, 1979-2004
Date Written: January 2006
Abstract
After declining for most of the century, the share of employed American men regularly working more than 50 hours per week began to increase around 1970. This trend has been especially pronounced among highly educated, high-wage, salaried, and older men. Using two decades of CPS data, we rule out a number of factors, including business cycles, changes in observed labor force characteristics, and changes in the level of men's real hourly earnings as primary explanations of this trend. Instead we argue that increases in salaried men's marginal incentives to supply hours beyond 40 accounted for the recent rise. Since these increases were accompanied by a rough constancy in real earnings at 40 hours, they can be interpreted as a compensated wage increase.
Keywords: labor supply, work hours
JEL Classification: J22
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?
Recommended Papers
-
Rotten Apples: An Investigation of the Prevalence and Predictors of Teacher Cheating
By Brian Jacob and Steven D. Levitt
-
By Paul Glewwe, Nauman Ilias, ...
-
By Brian Jacob
-
Winning Isn't Everything: Corruption in Sumo Wrestling
By Mark Duggan and Steven D. Levitt
-
The Market for Teacher Quality
By Eric A. Hanushek, John F. Kain, ...
-
Food for Thought: The Effects of School Accountability Plans on School Nutrition
By David N. Figlio and Joshua Winicki
-
The Central Role of Noise in Evaluating Interventions that Use Test Scores to Rank Schools
By Kenneth Y. Chay, Patrick J. Mcewan, ...
-
Does School Accountability Lead to Improved Student Performance?