IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mea/meawpa/06101.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Market Work, Home Production, Consumer Demand and Unemployment among the Unskilled

Author

Listed:
  • Melanie Lührmann
  • Matthias Weiss

    (Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA))

Abstract

We propose and test a general equilibrium model in which longer working time and higher labor force participation lead to a fall in unemployment. Longer working hours and higher labor force participation have two direct effects: People have higher incomes and less (leisure) time. This has implications for the composition of consumer demand, since people spend less time on home production. Instead, they outsource more domestic tasks to the market. Consumer demand shifts toward unskill-intensive goods. The relative demand for unskilled labor rises and unemployment falls. We test our model in two ways: First, we study the link between labor market partici- pation, home production and the demand for household and similar services using the German time use survey conducted in 1991/92. Second, we use cross-country time- series data on OECD countries between 1980 and 2003 to directly examine the link between labor force participation and the unemployment rate. The empirical results corroborate the predictions from the theoretical model.

Suggested Citation

  • Melanie Lührmann & Matthias Weiss, 2006. "Market Work, Home Production, Consumer Demand and Unemployment among the Unskilled," MEA discussion paper series 06101, Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA) at the Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy.
    • Handle: RePEc:mea:meawpa:06101
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://mea.mpisoc.mpg.de/uploads/user_mea_discussionpapers/shya0sy2c8t2502p_MEA-DP-101-06.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ernst Fehr & Simon Gächter, 2000. "Fairness and Retaliation: The Economics of Reciprocity," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 159-181, Summer.
    2. F. Thomas Juster & James P. Smith, 2004. "Improving the Quality of Economic Data: Lessons from the HRS and AHEAD," Labor and Demography 0402010, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Winter, Joachim, 0000. "Bracketing effects in categorized survey questions and the measurement of economic quantities," Sonderforschungsbereich 504 Publications 02-35, Sonderforschungsbereich 504, Universität Mannheim;Sonderforschungsbereich 504, University of Mannheim.
    4. Jennifer Hunt, 1999. "Has Work-Sharing Worked in Germany?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 117-148.
    5. Tilman Bruck & John P. Haisken-De New & Klaus Zimmermann, 2006. "Creating low skilled jobs by subsidizing market-contracted household work," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(8), pages 899-911.
    6. Michael D. Hurd & Susann Rohwedder, 2003. "The Retirement-Consumption Puzzle Anticipated and Actual Declines in Spending at Retirement," Working Papers DRU-3009, RAND Corporation.
    7. Pierre Cahuc & André Zylberberg, 2004. "Labor Economics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 026203316x, April.
    8. Mark Aguiar & Erik Hurst, 2004. "Consumption vs. Expenditure," NBER Working Papers 10307, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Weiss, Matthias, 2008. "Skill-biased technological change: Is there hope for the unskilled?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 100(3), pages 439-441, September.
    10. Matthias Weiss & Alfred Garloff, 2009. "Skill-biased technological change and endogenous benefits: the dynamics of unemployment and wage inequality," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(7), pages 811-821.
    11. Ronald Schettkat & Wiemer Salverda, 2004. "Demand Patterns and Employment Growth, Consumption and Services in France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States," DEMPATEM Working Papers wp13, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lührmann, Melanie & Weiss, Matthias, 2010. "The effect of working time and labor force participation on unemployment: A new argument in an old debate," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 67-82, January.
    2. Lothar Essig & Joachim K. Winter, 2009. "Item Non-Response to Financial Questions in Household Surveys: An Experimental Study of Interviewer and Mode Effects," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 30(Special I), pages 367-390, December.
    3. Ronald L. Oaxaca & Galiya Sagyndykova, 2020. "The effect of overtime regulations on employment," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 1-89, December.
    4. Garloff, Alfred, 2008. "Minimum wages, wage dispersion and unemployment : a review on new search models," IAB-Discussion Paper 200833, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    5. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:3:y:2004:i:9:p:1-12 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Trinh Le & Euan Richardson, 2023. "Expenditure patterns of New Zealand retiree households," Working Papers 23_07, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    7. Michael D. Hurd & Susann Rohwedder, 2005. "Changes in Consumption and Activities in Retirement," Working Papers wp096, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    8. Pierre Cahuc & André Zylberberg, 2008. "Reduction of working time and unemployment," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00255770, HAL.
    9. Karen A. Kopecky, 2011. "The Trend In Retirement," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 52(2), pages 287-316, May.
    10. Garry F. Barrett & Matthew Brzozowski, 2010. "Involuntary Retirement and the Resolution of the Retirement-Consumption Puzzle: Evidence from Australia," Social and Economic Dimensions of an Aging Population Research Papers 275, McMaster University.
    11. Thorsten Schank, 2015. "Employment effects of longer working hours," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 216-216, December.
    12. John Laitner & Daniel Silverman, 2006. "Consumption, Retirement, and Social Security: Evaluating the Efficiency of Reform with a Life-Cycle Model," Working Papers wp142, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    13. Lührmann Melanie, 2010. "Consumer Expenditures and Home Production at Retirement – New Evidence from Germany," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 11(2), pages 225-245, May.
    14. Erik Hurst, 2004. "Grasshoppers, Ants and Pre-Retirement Wealth: A Test of Permanent Income Consumers," Working Papers wp088, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    15. Steven J. Haider & Melvin Stephens, 2007. "Is There a Retirement-Consumption Puzzle? Evidence Using Subjective Retirement Expectations," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(2), pages 247-264, May.
    16. Enrico D’Elia & Bianca Martelli, 2003. "Estimation of Households Income from Bracketed Income Survey Data," ISAE Working Papers 35, ISTAT - Italian National Institute of Statistics - (Rome, ITALY).
    17. John Laitner & Dan Silverman, 2007. "Life-Cycle Models: Lifetime Earnings and the Timing of Retirement," Working Papers wp165, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    18. Erik Hurst, 2008. "The Retirement of a Consumption Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 13789, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. John Laitner & Dan Silverman, 2005. "Estimating Life-Cycle Parameters from Consumption Behavior at Retirement," NBER Working Papers 11163, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Joachim Winter, 2004. "Response bias in survey-based measures of household consumption," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 3(9), pages 1-12.
    21. Andrew Au & Olivia S. Mitchell & John W.R. Phillips, 2005. "Saving Shortfalls and Delayed Retirement," Working Papers wp094, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • J23 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Demand
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mea:meawpa:06101. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Henning Frankenberger (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.mea.mpisoc.mpg.de/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.