Social Participation and Hours Worked

Stefano Bartolini and Ennio Bilancini

Department of Economics University of Siena from Department of Economics, University of Siena

Abstract: We investigate the relationship between social participation and the hours worked in the market. Social participation is the component of social capital that measures individuals’ engament in groups, associations and non-governmental organizations. We provide a model of consumer choice where social participation may be either a substitute or a complement to material consumption – depending on whether participation is instrumentally or non-instrumentally motivated – and where a local environment with greater social participation increases the return to individual participation. We carry out an empirical investigation of this framework using survey data on United States for the period 1972-2004. We find that non-instrumental social participation substantially decreases the hours worked, while instrumental social participation substantially increases them. Moreover, evidence is consistent with the idea that a local environment with greater social participation fosters individual social participation.

Keywords: social participation; relational goods; social capital; work hours; instrumental and non-instrumental motivations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A13 D62 J22 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-evo, nep-hrm, nep-lab and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (22)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Social Participation and Hours Worked (2011)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:usi:wpaper:620

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