UNECE Statistical Commission

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American Time Use SurveyOverview Gender
Analyses

• UNECE Statistical Commission
• Gender Statistics meeting
• September 11-13, 2006

Diane Herz Bureau of Labor Statistics United
States Department of Labor
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ATUS Background

• New survey on time use in U.S.
• First federally administered, continuous U.S.
  time use survey
• Produces nationally representative data by
  demographic characteristics
• Why BLS conducts the survey
• non-market activities
• quality of life beyond income and earnings
• trends in work, including changes in location and
  timing
• additional source of work hours
• international comparisons
• Gender analyses
• Not specifically designed for gender analyses,
  but rich in data
• Possible analyses reflect survey design

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ATUS Sample

• People in households that recently completed the
  national labor force survey, the Current
  Population Survey (CPS)
• Nationally representative data by demographic
  characteristics
• Stratified by household characteristics
• Survey of individuals 15 and over
• Each person is pre-selected for a specific day
• Half are interviewed about a weekday, and half
  about a weekend day

Households (stratified)
Individuals (randomly selected)
Day of week (assigned)
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ATUS Interview

• Explanatory letter, brochure sent in advance
• Computer-assisted telephone interviews
• (2,000/mo in 2003 1,100/mo in 2004-05)
• One-time only interview
• No proxy responses
• Contents
• Core 24-hour time diary about yesterday
• Updates of demographic and labor force
  information
• Module information

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Survey Structure
Paid Work Child Care Volunteering Missed Days
Summary Questions
Labor Force Updates
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Household Roster
How is NAME related to you?
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ATUS Diary
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ATUS diary data
Activity Start Stop Location
Worked 810 am 1145 pm Workplace
Ate lunch 1145 am 120 pm Workplace
Worked 120 pm 445 pm Workplace
Drove to grocery store 445 pm 552 pm Car (Driver)
Shopped for groceries 552 pm 615 pm Grocery store

• How many hours per day do people work?
• On which days?
• At what times?
• Where?
• How do workers spend their non-work time?

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Post-diary Summary Questions

• To clearly and consistently identify work
  activities (which activities were done as part of
  job)
• To measure childcare as a secondary activity
  (during which activities were children lt13 in
  your care)
• To enable coders to distinguish volunteering for
  organizations from care activities for
  individuals (which activities were done for or
  through an organization)
• To identify types of activities the survey may be
  missing because of the 24-hour design

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ATUS Coding

• Each activities is assigned a 6-digit code
• Each code represents 3 levels of detail (17, 105,
  438)
• Design enables analytical flexibility
• Interviewers also perform activity coding
• 100 verification

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ATUS Data Files

• Annual files are posted each summer with release
  of data
• Documentation provided
• Files are organized to avoid duplication. Files
  include
• Activity file
• Individual file demographics and CPS updates
• CPS data for matching (not updated in ATUS)
• Who was with you file
• Survey methods file

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ATUS Analyses

• Population estimates (e.g. time use of mothers)
• Participants (e.g. time spent working among those
  who worked on the diary day)
• Time of Day (e.g when women employed part time
  work)
• Where activities were done (e.g. work at home)
• Who was in the room with or accompanied
  respondent during activities (e.g. time with
  children)
• Start and stop times of activities
• International comparisons
• Time series

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Sample of existing gender analyses

• Intra-household allocation of time (husbands v.
  wives)
• Trends in housework time by gender task
• Child care timeactive care versus secondary
• Input to national accounts (output, income,
  productivity)
• Adult care giving time
• Contribution of volunteer labor to nonprofit
  output
• Injury and death valuation
• Tradeoff analyses (e.g. work leisure by
  presence of children)
• Activities of non-working men and women

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ATUS Modules

• Questions on special topics, up to 5 minutes
• Currently food eating module by USDA
• January 2006 - December 2007
• 9 questions on secondary eating, school meal
  programs, height and weight, and income
• Other possibilities
• Eldercare
• Purchased child care services
• Well-being
• Tool use and appliance ownership

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• A few descriptive statistics
• From ATUS

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Analyzing ATUS The average day does not look
like anyones typical day
Caring for others 0.8 hour
Other 3.1 hours
Eating and drinking 1.2 hours
Sleeping 8.6 hours
Household activities 1.8 hours
Working 3.3 hours
Leisure and sports 5.2 hours
Total 24.0 hours
Annual averages, 2004
Universe All persons 15 and over all days of
the week combined.
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Time use on an average work day for employed
persons ages 25 to 54 with children
Caring for others 1.3 hours
Other 2.5 hours
Eating and drinking 1.0 hour
Sleeping 7.5 hours
Household activities 1.1 hour
Leisure and sports 2.6 hours
Working 8.0 hours
Total 24.0 hours
Universe Employed persons ages 25 to 54 who
worked on the diary day lived in households
with children under 18 weekdays only
Annual averages, 2004
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Average sleep times per day, by age and sex
Universe All persons 15 and over all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2003
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Adult women with children under age 6 spent the
most time providing primary childcare
Hours providing primary childcare per day
Universe Adults 18 and over living in
households with children under 18 all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2004
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Both men and women spent many more hours
providing secondary care than primary care
Hours providing secondary childcare per day
Universe Adults 18 and over living in
households with children under 13 all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2004
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Women spend more time per day than men doing
housework, care activities, and purchasing
activities
Average hours per day
Universe All persons 15 and over all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2004
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Two-thirds of women report preparing food and
half report doing housework on an average day
Proportion doing activity on average day
Universe All persons 15 and over all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2004
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Weekday activity profiles of married full-time
workers ages 25 to 54 who lived in households
with children under 18 and worked on the diary
day Men and Women
Average hours per day
Annual averages, 2004
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Weekday activity profiles of married women ages
25 to 54 in households with children under 6
Employed full time vs. Not employed

Average hours per day
Annual averages, 2004
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About half of leisure time is spent watching TV
Other leisure activities (22 minutes)
Playing games using computer for leisure (20
minutes)
Relaxing and thinking (17 minutes)
Watching TV (2.6 hours)
Sports, exercise, recreation (20 minutes)
Reading (23 minutes)
Total 5.1 hours
Socializing and Communicating (37 minutes)
Universe All persons 15 and over all days of
the week combined.
Annual averages, 2004
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Percent of employed persons doing selected
activities on workdays by hour of the day
Universe Employed persons 15 and over who worked
on the diary day
Annual averages, 2004
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Percent of available time that older Americans
spent with others, 2003 and 2004
  Men Men Men Men Women Women Women Women
  55-59 60-64 65-69 70 55-59 60-64 65-69 70
Alone 49 49 48 50 47 48 51 59
With Spouse 36 37 42 39 29 31 31 22
With Family 42 42 46 43 44 44 41 33
With Children 8 6 5 3 11 10 7 4
With Friends 4 5 4 5 5 6 6 5
Note For the social contact data, available
time excludes time spent working, sleeping,
grooming, and doing personal activities.
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ATUS Contact Information

• Program Manager Tina Shelley
• Website www.bls.gov/tus/
• Data files Documentation
• Publications
• Links to harmonized data set for US, MTUS
  database
• Program voice line [phone]-6339
• E-Mail ATUSInfo_at_bls.gov

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• Other slides that may be of interest

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Research using ATUS data on work

• What Do Male Nonworkers Do? Evidence from the
  American Time Use Survey (Frazis Stewart)
• Shift Work and Participation in Social,
  Recreational, or Exercise Activities (Polivka)
• What Can Time-Use Data Tell Us About Hours of
  Work? (Frazis Stewart) Dec 2004 Monthly Labor
  Review
• The Time and Timing Costs of Market Work, and
  their Implications for Retirement (Hamermesh)
  http//www.iza.org/
• Available at http//www.atususers.umd.edu/papers
  /atusconference/authors/

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Research on nonmarket activities using ATUS data

• The Chore Wars Household Bargaining and Leisure
  Time (Friedberg Webb)
• Accounting for Nonmarket Production A Prototype
  Satellite Account Using the American Time Use
  Survey (Landefeld, Fraumeni, Vojtech)
• Time to Eat Household Production Under
  Increasing Income Inequality (Hamermesh)
• How Does Household Production Affect Earnings
  Inequality? Evidence from the ATUS (Frazis
  Stewart) BLS working paper 393
• Available at http//www.atususers.umd.edu/papers
  /atusconference/authors/

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Research using ATUS data on care activities
includes

• The Effects of Schooling on Parental Time in
  Education Production (DeSimone)
• Fathers Time Investments in Children Do Sons
  Get More? (Mammen)
• Maternal Employment and Family Caregiving
  Rethinking Time With Children in the ATUS
  (Bianchi)
• The Gender Gap in Caregiving to Adults
  (Mathiowetz Oliker)
• Available at http//www.atususers.umd.edu/papers
  /atusconference/authors/

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Other research

• Non-BLS
• Nonresponse in the American Time Use Survey Who
  is Missing From the Data and How Much Does it
  Matter? (Abraham, Maitland, Bianchi)
• Measurement of Travel Behavior in a Trip-based
  Survey Versus a Time Use Survey (Bose Sharp)
• Time Use for Sleeping in Relation to Waking
  Activities (Dinges)
• BLS
• How Does Employment Affect the Timing of Time
  with Children? (Allard, Bianchi, Stewart)
• What Do Older Americans Do? (Krantz-Kent
  Stewart)
• Time Use as a Way of Examining Contexts of
  Adolescent Development in the United States
  (Vernon)
• Available at http//www.atususers.umd.edu/papers
  /atusconference/authors/

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Research using ATUS data on leisure activities
includes

• Here Comes the Rain Again Weather and the
  Intertemporal Substitution of Leisure (Connolly)
• Measuring Trends in Leisure The Allocation of
  Time Over Five Decades (Aguiar Hurst)
• Available at http//www.atususers.umd.edu/papers
  /atusconference/authors/

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Summary questions Work
Some activities were work but werent identified
as such in the diary
Others were income-generating activities other
than for ones job
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Summary questions Secondary child care

• Calculate duration of time respondent had
  child(ren) under 13 in his or her care while
  doing other things.

• Consistency rules
• Respondent cannot be sleeping and providing care.
• Respondent cannot be providing primary and
  secondary care at the same time (no
  double-counting).
• Care must be done in the window between when
  first child under 13 got up and last child under
  13 went to bed.

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Summary questions Volunteering

• Added to enable coders to distinguish
  volunteering for organizations from care
  activities for individuals
• Used CPS definition of volunteering

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Summary questions Missed Days
Concern 24-hour protocol means ATUS misses
activities done on trips of 2 or more
nights. Knowing how many trips and what type
provides a general idea what we are missing.
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ATUS Basics Response rates