Krugman: Europeans have steadily reduced working hours as labor force participation rises

[pampango]

Yglesias asks, if the middle class is under pressure, what exactly is it that ordinary American families have less of (or rather, had less of before the Great Recession struck). After all, people do seem to have more stuff.

But one important answer is, they have less time — specifically less family time.



Now, you might be tempted to say that something like this was bound to happen along with social changes that led to more women in the paid working force. But the sharp increase in total hours worked per family didn’t have to happen; more female labor force participation could have been offset by shorter working hours. In fact, that’s exactly what did happen in Europe; at this point major European nations, France in particular, have fully matched the US in employment rates for both male and female prime-age adults:

So what we have is a situation in which American families have more stuff, but they have managed to afford that stuff only by being two-income families, with ever less family time — unlike their European counterparts, who have gained in shorter hours and vacations what they lost in stay-at-home wives.

It’s not hard to think of reasons for this divergence; many of them come down to sharply rising inequality and the rat race this inequality creates. More on that in later posts.



http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/26/what-we-have-less-of/

Another problem of American families caused by our stark income inequality as compared to that in Europe - less family time.

[xchrom]

1. du rec. nt

[ProSense]

2. True, but

most Americans also have less income, which has been on the decline for decades, especially for low-income Americans.

A Thanksgiving Reminder That America Alone Doesn’t Guarantee Time Off For Vacations Or Holidays
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021867711

[lunatica]

3. I was talking about this to a friend recently

Wondering why we don't go to a 4 work day week in this country. Do we really need that much more productivity than we did before the computer, fax and scanning devices were introduced? It seemed that everyone was pretty happy with productivity before that. Sure it took a little longer to send documents via mail rather than faxing or scanning them, but if we went to a 4 word day week we would still be far more productive, or perhaps just faster about it. And if we all worked a maximum of 4 days and the companies wanted to stay open 7 days, then hire more people and share the job. They would have happier workers who would probably do as much work as people today who work 5 days. Just pay a living wage which ought to be doable since there's a high level of productivity anyway.

tweek it and it could work.

[Wednesdays]

6. Sure, they'll gladly give us a 4 day work week!

Along with a 20% reduction in pay. Oh, and no benefits 'cause you're not working full time anymore, bud.
See how that works?

[lunatica]

10. Well, I did say tweek it didn't I?

It's quite possible we could get Universal Health Care some time in the future, in which case no one gives a shit whether the company gives benefits or not because we would already have them. And the 20% reduction in pay? How about making that against the law.

Anything can happen. One has to believe that just to keep fighting in this war.

[Yavin4]

14. I had that "hire more people" fight with my former boss

who wanted literally 24/7 coverage with no OT, which meant that exempt employees had to do the weekend and evening coverages.

[lunatica]

18. That's one reason why I belong to a union

I see it this way. There's a reason we have unions. There are some decent employers who treat their employees well, but unfortunately there are more employers who are stopped from being as abusive as they can be by laws, and by unions. If those laws go away or as unions lose power you see that abuse emerging.

The good thing is they're so abusive that eventually the only way to fight back is to unionize.

[Yavin4]

22. I Hear You Loud and Clear

In my situation, my former employer was breaking NY state labor laws regarding OT. Exempt employees are not supposed to work OT.

[eridani]

4. When you have fewer and fewer people making more and more stuff--

--you just can't tell the displaced people that they can't have any more stuff unless you want permanent economic stagnation. Oh, wait....

Shorter work hours for all would reverse this in short order.

[coldbeer]

5. I think we should have less working hours ...

and more people working!

[Wednesdays]

7. But that would cut into corporate PROFITS

Think of the shareholders!

[Champion Jack]

8. Bingo!

[Puzzledtraveller]

15. No it won't, that will cut into the workers paychecks

the corporate heads aren't going to suffere any loss. Reduced hours will not come with the same pay.

[pampango]

17. You're right. It would come out of workers' paychecks in the US. In Europe, by contrast,

workers have reduced the number of hours they work but maintained/improved their standard of living.

[lunatica]

19. Proof that it can be done and therefore if we want it

we can make it happen. How did it happen in Europe? Did the government one day just decide to do it all by themselves? Or did the people actually make it happen? And how did they do that? Probably by voting for parties that are truly representative of their constituency. I also remember various times when the French had some pretty major pubic riots.

[pampango]

21. Well said. +1 n/t

[LWolf]

9. Hmmm.

I wonder if more family time would result in less stress-related mental health issues, and more opportunity to address mental health issues sooner and more vigorously.

Shorter working hours? I'd be so much healthier and happier.

[Doctor_J]

11. Which is easy to do when UHC is available

Seriously, how many Americans cling to their jobs because they have to have health insurance? Even shitty jobs? the US health insurance racket might be the biggest rip-off ever perpetrated.

[Loudestlib]

12. Wages

We need to do something about the wages being paid to people. With the destruction of the Unions I don't know who is going to push for this?

[AllyCat]

13. Imagine a 4 day work week with UHC.

I could actually afford a pay reduction with UHC. My employer would not be screwing us over trying to get us to pay more for a cheaper insurance plan that offers less actual health care (yes, that's what is happening right now). One day a week, every parent would have a day that they could pick up the kids from school and do something fun, like visit a museum or go to the park. There would be one day you did not have to use your precious "earned time" just to go to the doctor. Happier workers, healthier Americans, more productive people, and greater employment.

Nah. Corporate America would never tolerate that. We must work until we die for them to be happy, and the less they pay us to do it, the better off they will be.

[bhikkhu]

16. That's because all they have left is crappy part-time jobs!

...kidding, of course.

Krugman makes a very good point, which has been a good point for a very long time: most of our employment problem here has to do with low wages. In a normal household, you shouldn't have to have every adult working for wages to keep the household intact. There are plenty of valuable roles in society that don't involve "working for wages", and in the US they are squeezed to the bone. "Life" is a lesser thing here, and society suffers.

The other thing about that is that the regular and consistent chime about there being "no jobs" and "only crappy jobs" is hardly true - its just that the 146 million or so jobs that we do have don't pay as well as they should and don't allow people anywhere near the freedom that they should. Or that's a bigger and more entrenched problem, imho.

[lunatica]

20. It's ironic that

the minimum wage laws were first implemented to protect women and children workers from being paid too little. I'm sure employers raged with raised fists at the injustice of that back then. Now they cling to it for dear life and rage at even a meager increase.

It leaves a bitter taste doesn't it?