The disutility of commuting? The effect of gender and local labour markets

Luke Munford, Nigel Rice, Jennifer Roberts and Nikita Jacob
Additional contact information
Luke Munford: Manchester Centre for Health Economics, University of Manchester

No 2018010, Working Papers from The University of Sheffield, Department of Economics

Abstract: Commuting is an extremely important modern phenomenon characterised by the spatial interaction of housing and labour markets. The average commuter in the UK spends nearly an hour a day travelling to and from employment. Standard economic theory postulates that commuting is a choice behaviour undertaken when compensated through either lower rents or greater amenities in the housing market or through greater wages in the labour market. By exploiting exogenous shocks to commuting time, this paper investigates the impact on wellbeing of increased commuting. Ceteris paribus, exogenous increases in commuting time are expected to lower wellbeing. We find this holds for women but not men. This phenomenon can be explained, in part, by the different labour markets in which women operate. Where local labour markets are thin, women report significantly lower wellbeing when faced with an increased commute. This does not hold for tight local labour markets. Further our findings reveal that it is full-time working women in the managerial and professional tier of the occupational hierarchy who are most affected.

Keywords: commuting; exogenous shocks; well-being; panel data econometrics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C1 I1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35 pages
Date: 2018-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur, nep-hap, nep-hea, nep-lma and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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http://www.sheffield.ac.uk/economics/research/serps/articles/2018_010 First version, June 2018 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The disutility of commuting? The effect of gender and local labor markets (2019)
Working Paper: The disutility of commuting? The effect of gender and local labour markets (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:shf:wpaper:2018010

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