Understanding the Causes and Consequences of Long-Run Trends in Work and Leisure

摘要经济主体的时间利用对人力资本形成、劳动力供给、家庭生产、休闲和总体经济成果具有重要的影响，因此对经济学家和政策制定者具有重要意义。以这种方式计算时间的使用，为生活水平提供了另一个维度。然而，大多数关于经济主体时间使用的研究都依赖于横截面数据或短时间序列数据，这些数据没有考虑到其他形式的时间使用，例如家庭生产。这个研究项目将测量过去一百年来美国人时间分配的趋势。它还调查这些趋势的来源，并研究人口和技术变化对经济波动的影响。该项目的第一部分收集了更准确的时间使用数据，发现美国人闲暇时间随着时间的推移而增加的说法站不住脚。该项目的第二部分将调查人口和技术变化对20世纪时间使用的影响，而研究的第三部分将调查人口变化对中期经济波动的影响。这些都是尚未用更全面的数据集进行调查的重要问题。在美国进行时间使用分析的主要问题之一是缺乏适当的数据。这个项目将收集关于时间使用的独特数据集，这些数据说明了很长一段时间内男性和女性的家庭生产情况，这将对其他研究人员有用。在上个世纪，洗衣机等节省时间的技术的引进对妇女参与劳动力产生了重大影响。这项研究将有助于回答一些重要的问题，如家用电器的扩散和家庭工人的移民对时间使用的影响，这些问题由于最近的移民辩论而成为焦点。这项研究还有助于回答经常被重复的观点，即人口变化会导致中期经济波动。因此，该研究将对人口变化的宏观经济影响提供一些启示。本研究结果将对劳工政策产生重要影响。通过回答这些问题，本研究项目将对经济科学做出重大贡献，并提供更广泛的政策影响。

Proposal No: 0617219 Institution: NBER NSF Program: ECONOMICS Principal Investigator: Ramey, Valerie Title: Understanding the Causes and Consequences of Long-Run Trends in Work and Leisure ABSTRACTTime use by economic agents is important to economist and policy makers as it has implications for human capital formation, labor supplies, home production, leisure, and economic outcomes generally. Accounting for time use in this way gives another dimension of living standards. However, most studies of time use by economic agents have relied on cross sectional data or short time series data that does not account for other forms of time use, such as home production. This research project will measure trends in the allocation of time in the US over the last one hundred years. It also investigates the sources of those trends and studies the consequences of demographic and technical changes for economic fluctuations. The first part of the project collects more accurate data of time use and finds that the claim of increasing leisure time over time in the US does not hold up. The second part of the project will investigate the impact of demographic and technological changes on time use during the 20th century while the third part of the study will investigate the effects of demographic changes affect medium term economic fluctuation. These are important issues that have not been investigated with a more comprehensive data set.One of the major problems associated with an analysis of time use in the US is lack of appropriate data. This project will collect a unique data set on time use that accounts for home production for both males and females over a very long period of time that will be useful to the other researchers. In the last century, the introduction of time saving technologies, such as the washing machine, has had a major impact on labor force participation of women. The research will help to answer important questions such as the effects of the diffusion of household appliances and immigration of household workers affect time use, questions that have come to center stage as a result of the recent immigration debate. The research could also help answer the oft repeated argument that demographic changes cause medium term economic fluctuations. Thus the research will provide some illumination on the macroeconomic impacts of demographic changes. The results of this research project will have important labor policy impacts. By answering these questions, this research project will contribute substantially to economic science as well as provide broader policy impacts.