Hours Worked (Long-Run Trends)

Jeremy Greenwood () and Guillaume Vandenbroucke ()

No 10, Economie d'Avant Garde Research Reports from Economie d'Avant Garde

Abstract: For 200 years the average number of hours worked per worker declined, both in the market place and in the home. Technological progress is the engine of such transformation. Three mechanisms are stressed: (i) The rise in real wages and its corresponding wealth effect; (ii) The enhanced value of time off from work, due to the advent of time-using leisure goods; (iii) The reduced need for housework, due to the introduction of time-saving appliances. These mechanisms are incorporated into a model of household production. The notion of Edgeworth-Pareto complementarity/substitutability is key to the analysis. Numerical examples link theory and data.

Keywords: Hours worked; leisure; housework; household production; Edgeworth-Pareto complementarity/substitutability; technological progress (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 J22 O11 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec and nep-mac
Date: 2005-06
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Related works:
Working Paper: Hours Worked: Long-Run Trends (2005)
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