TIME USE, NON-MARKET WORK, AND FAMILY WELL-BEING

A conference cosponsored by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and
the MacArthur Network on the Family and the Economy
November 20-21, 1997
Conference room of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Washington, DC

• Welcome and Introductory Remarks
• Session 1: Economic Theory, Non-Market Work, and Human Capital
• Session II: Economic Valuation of Non-Market Work: International Perspectives
• Session III. Family Time: Quantities and Qualities
• Session IV: Children and Time
• Session V: Measuring Non-Market Labor Using a Time-Use Methodology
• Session VI: Time-Use Surveys: Where should the BLS go from here?
• Session VII: Time Use and Public Policy
• Session VIII: Finishing up -- What do we do next?

Conference summaries written by the following graduate student participants:

Michelle Budig, Lynn Hatch, Matthew Lyon, Katherin Ross,
Jodi Roth and Jennifer Ward-Batts

Edited by Lynn Hatch

These summaries have not been reviewed by the conference organizers or presenters

Welcome and Introductory Remarks
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Michael Horrigan, Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) opened the conference, welcomed everyone and introduced the organizing agencies: the MacArthur Network on the Family and the Economy (the MacArthur Network); the Women's Bureau, US Department of Labor; and the BLS.

Katharine Abraham, BLS, welcomed everyone, thanked the foreign visitors and financial contributors and briefly described the MacArthur Network. Both the BLS and the MacArthur Foundation have a long history of commitment to issues. The BLS has been working on the measurement of changes in the cost of living. However just looking at the price of goods for consumers, for example, is not adequate, we need to look at time too. We need a better understanding of how people allocate both money and time. How should we measure non-market work? How should we develop time-use surveys? These are two of the difficult questions currently being pondered. The BLS is developing some methods and surveys in conjunction with other statistical agencies.

Where should the BLS go from here? It would be ideal to collect information on time-use, but there are many issues related to measuring unpaid work. Others, academics and non-academics, are working on these issues, in particular, conference participants from Australia, Statistics Canada, the United Nations, the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development, and the Women's Bureau. In addition to academic pursuits, there are numerous policy interests in measuring non-market work. Since 1993 in the United States, Congress has introduced legislation to have the BLS collect time-use information including work-at-home data and add this new data to the System of National Accounts (SNA). There will be considerable interest even outside the academic arena for what comes out of this conference. From the BLS' perspective, an ideal outcome from the conference would be to begin collecting information on time use on an ongoing and regular basis.