BLS WORKING PAPERS 

 

U.S. Department of Labor 

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

Office of Productivity and Technology 

Are Those Who Bring Work Home Really Working Longer Hours? 

Implications for BLS Productivity Measures 

Lucy P. Eldridge, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

Sabrina Wulff Pabilonia, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

Working Paper 406

May 2007

All views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the 

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. 
Are Those Who Bring Work Home Really Working Longer Hours? 

Implications for BLS Productivity Measures*

Lucy P. Eldridge 

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

2 Massachusetts Ave., NE Rm. 2150 

Washington, DC 20212 

202-691-6598 

Eldridge.Lucy@bls.gov 

Sabrina Wulff Pabilonia 

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

2 Massachusetts Ave., NE Rm. 2180 

Washington, DC 20212 

202-691-5614 

Pabilonia.Sabrina@bls.gov 

May 7, 2007 

Abstract: An ongoing debate surrounding BLS productivity data is that official labor 

productivity measures may be overstating productivity growth because of an increase in 

unmeasured hours worked outside the traditional workplace. This paper uses both the ATUS and 

May CPS Work Schedules and Work at Home Supplements to determine whether the number of 

hours worked by nonfarm business employees are underestimated and increasing over time due 

to unmeasured hours worked at home. We find that 8 - 9 percent of nonfarm business employees 

bring some work home from the workplace. In addition, those who bring work home report 

working longer hours than those who work exclusively in a workplace, resulting in a 0.8 – 1.1 

percent understatement of measured hours worked. However, we find no conclusive evidence 

that productivity trends were biased over the 1997-2005 period due to work brought home from 

the workplace. 

* The authors thank Michael Giandrea, Anastasiya Osborne, Peter Meyer, Alice Nakamura, Phyllis Otto, Anne 

Polivka, Larry Rosenblum, Younghwan Song, Jay Stewart, Leo Sveikauskas, and Cindy Zoghi. All data and 

programs are available from Sabrina Wulff Pabilonia. All views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and 

do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. 
I. Introduction

 Advancements in information technology have increased workers’ abilities to conduct 

their jobs in multiple locations. An ongoing debate surrounding U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

(BLS) productivity data is that official productivity numbers may be overstated because of an 

increase in unmeasured hours worked outside the traditional workplace. To shed light on this 

debate, this paper examines two recent data sources for information on U.S. workers who bring 

work home from their primary workplace — the 2003 - 2005 American Time Use Survey 

(ATUS) and the 1997, 2001, and 2004 May Current Population Survey Work Schedules and 

Work at Home Supplements (CPS Supplement). The ATUS provides detailed information on 

time spent on work, work-related activities, and non-work activities on one diary day, as well as 

locations for these activities. The CPS Supplements provide information on the number of hours 

worked at home each week, whether or not workers had a formal arrangement to be paid for 

work at home, and reasons for working at home. 

Previous research on work at home has almost entirely focused on home-based workers 

or part-time teleworkers. This study examines work that is brought home from the workplace. 

The study achieves three goals: determines the characteristics of those who bring work home 

from the workplace and sheds light on why they bring work home; determines whether those 

who bring work home work longer hours or whether they are simply shifting the location of 

work; and finally, assesses whether the BLS captures the hours worked at home by those who 

bring work home from the workplace in its hours and productivity measures and whether 

unmeasured hours worked at home affect productivity trends. 

 
II. Prior Research 

Previous research both on hours worked in other time-use surveys and on work-at-home

arrangements are relevant to this paper; however, only Callister and Dixon (2001) specifically 

examined workers who work both at the workplace and at home on the same day. Using the 

1999 New Zealand Time-Use Survey, they showed that 15.5 percent of non-agricultural weekday 

workers combined work at a traditional workplace with work at home on their diary day. This 

was much more common than working exclusively from home (8.3 percent). The majority of 

work at home lasted for less than two hours and a significant proportion was done in the 

evenings and on weekends. 

Recent research on work-at-home arrangements in North America often includes paid

work done by home-based workers or occasional telecommuters. Oettinger (2004) used the 

1980, 1990, and 2000 U.S. Census to examine the growth in home-based employment. He 

showed that the wage penalty for working at home has decreased over time and that the increase 

in home-based work has been greatest for highly-educated workers. Using the May 1997 CPS 

Work at Home supplement, Schroeder and Warren (2004) analyzed workers who did any work at 

home, including home-based workers, occasional telecommuters, and those who combine work 

in a traditional workplace with work at home. They found that compared to traditional office 

workers, workers who did any work at home are likely to be older, better educated, married, 

white, and live in an urban area. They also found that managers and professionals are more 

likely to report some work at home than other occupational groups. 

Using the 2001 CPS Supplement, Wight and Bianchi (2004) examined women who did 

some work at home. They found that being white, college-educated, married, and working in a 

higher paying occupation increased the probability of doing some (but not all) work at home

2
versus doing no work at home. They found that for women with children there is in the 

probability of working all of their hours at home versus none but no difference in the probability 

of working some of their hours at home versus none. 

Using the Canadian Workplace and Employee Survey, Pabilonia (2005) analyzed the 

decision of employees to do paid work at home during part of their normal working hours 

(referred to as telecommuters) and the decision of firms to allow these employees to 

telecommute. In 2001, the 5.9 percent of telecommuters among Canadian workers were more 

likely to be tech-savvy, experienced white-collar workers than their non-telecommuting 

counterparts. 

Evidence from older household time-use diaries indicated that respondents to labor force 

surveys similar to the CPS report higher hours worked compared to estimates from time-use 

diaries (Hamermesh (1990) used Michigan time use diary data for 1975 and 1981; and Robinson 

and Bostrom (1994) used three separate studies in 1965, 1975, and 1985).1

 Robinson and 

Bostrom (1994) showed that the difference between these surveys is greater for those who work 

long hours. Hamermesh (1990) and Robinson and Bostrom (1994) both showed that this 

difference increased over time. However, Jacobs (1998) found that independent, self-reported 

measures of working time based on time of departures to and returns from work support the 

estimates obtained from hours of work questions in labor force surveys. Until recently, no 

studies have compared hours worked from time diaries to hours reported to the post-redesign 

(1994) CPS questions, which were changed to enhance respondents’ recall concerning their 

hours of work in the prior week.2

 Using similar definitions of hours worked, Frazis and Stewart 

 

1

 Note that the sample sizes in these studies are smaller than the ATUS sample. 2

 In the 1994 revised CPS, the question on usual hours is asked first, followed by questions about overtime and

taking time off for reasons such as illness, slack work, vacation or holiday. Polivka and Rothgeb (1993, p. 16) report 

that “The mean of reported hours measured with the current [pre-1994] wording was 39.0 compared to 37.9 hours

3
(2004) found that CPS reported hours of work are similar to hours constructed from the ATUS 

for the 12 CPS reference weeks in 2003.3 However, Frazis and Stewart (2004) also found that 

ATUS respondents worked five percent fewer hours per week than reported in the CPS for 

weeks other than CPS reference weeks. Frazis and Stewart (2004) indicate that this is expected 

given that these weeks include holidays whereas the reference weeks were chosen to minimize 

holidays.4

 

III. Data Sources 

Productivity trends for the U.S. are watched closely by businessmen, policymakers, and 

others interested in business cycles and U.S. competitiveness. The most widely watched BLS 

productivity statistics are the quarterly labor productivity measures for the nonfarm business 

sector.5

 Throughout this paper, we focus our study on nonfarm business employees, defined as 

household survey respondents who are fifteen-years-old and older, work outside of the farm

sector, and are classified as employees of private for-profit entities. Although the self employed 

and unpaid family workers are in the nonfarm business sector, we exclude them because they 

may have the ability to shift freely between work and non-work activities and may lack a clear 

definition of the principal workplace; therefore, for this group, the concept of bringing work 

home is not well defined and beyond the scope of this study. For the ATUS, the analysis is 

further restricted to nonfarm business employees who worked on their diary day. 

 measured with the revised [1994- and later] wording.” This is a combined survey effect of the employment and 

hours questions. 3

 The CPS reference week is the calendar week that contains the 12th day of the month. 4

 Data was compiled across all months due to the limited number of observations. 5 The BLS also produces quarterly measures of labor productivity for the U.S. business and nonfinancial 

corporations sectors, and durable, nondurable, and total manufacturing sectors, as well as measures of multifactor

productivity for major sectors and labor productivity for select detailed industries. 

4
The American Time Use Survey 

The ATUS, which began collecting data in 2003, is a survey of how people living in the 

United States spend their time. The ATUS sample consists of one household member aged 

fifteen or older from a subset of households completing their final month of interviews for the 

CPS.6

 In 2003, there were 20,720 ATUS interviews. Beginning in December 2003, the sample 

size was reduced by 35 percent, yielding 13,973 completed diaries in 2004. In 2005, 

approximately 13,000 individual diaries were completed. The ATUS collects a 24-hour diary of 

activities that a respondent was engaged in starting at 4 A.M on the day prior to their interview. 

These diaries include information on work time, such as time at work, time spent on work 

activities at home, and interruptions of 15 minutes or longer that took place during the work 

day.7

 In addition to the types of activities and the time spent doing these activities, there is 

information on the demographic characteristics of the respondents, the locations where the 

activities took place, and the people who were with the respondent at the time of the activity. 

In order to analyze hours of work, we aggregated minutes spent on activities coded as 

work at main job for each ATUS respondent by location from the ATUS activity files, and 

constructed measures of work time at the workplace and at home. We restrict our analysis to 

work done for a respondent’s main job in order to focus on those who bring work home rather 

than those who may be doing some part-time work at home in the evenings. This restriction will 

also allow us to compare results with the CPS supplement, which only collected information 

 

6 The CPS is collected monthly for individuals in a sample of about 60,000 households. The CPS provides 

information on employment, hours worked, and demographics. Households are in the survey for four months, out

for eight months, and back in for four months. 7 ATUS interviewers are trained to ask for work breaks of 15 minutes or longer any time a respondent reports that

he or she worked. Beginning in January 2004, an automated probe was introduced into the survey instrument. If a 

respondent reports working for more than 4 hours at one time, the interviewer automatically is prompted to ask “Did

you take any breaks of 15 minutes or longer?” If the respondent reports taking a break, the interviewer records the 

start and stop time and what was done on that break; if no break, the solid work episode is recorded. 

5
about work at home for the main job. We may be underestimating work done at home to the 

extent that people combine work at their workplace with work at home on their second jobs. 

For respondents whose diary day was a nonholiday weekday, we define those who bring 

work home as respondents who report any minutes of work for their main job at the workplace 

and at home on the same day. This weekday group of employees represents primarily those who 

work at home before or after a typical work day. For respondents whose diary day is on a 

weekend or holiday, we define those who bring work home as respondents who report any 

minutes of work at home on their diary day. Unfortunately, we can not identify whether those 

who worked exclusively at home on a weekend diary day were home-based workers, 

telecommuters, or traditional 9-5 office workers who bring extra work home to do over the 

weekend. However, when we describe the relative hours worked below, it will become clear that 

this group consists primarily of employees who bring work home rather than home-based 

workers. 

 

The CPS Work Schedules and Work at Home Supplements 

The Work Schedules and Work at Home Supplements were collected as part of the May 

CPS in 1997, 2001 and 2004. Although changes in industry and occupational coding and 

changes in the sequence and wording of the questions on work at home limit the direct 

comparability of some data collected in 1997, we include data from all three years, noting the 

limitations as they occur. As previously mentioned, these supplements only collected 

information on whether respondents do any work at home as part of their main job. Wage and 

salary respondents who reported work at home were asked whether they had a formal agreement 

with their employer to be paid for work at home or whether they were just taking work home. 

6
We focus our analysis on those who reported that they were just taking work home, since 

their hours at home are those most likely to be unmeasured. We refer to this group as those who 

bring work home. We note here that this question did not allow for the possibility that an 

employee had a formal arrangement to be paid for work at home and also took work home.

8

 

Respondents were asked their reasons for working at home, how frequently they worked at 

home, and the number of hours per week worked at home. In 1997, respondents were asked for 

actual hours worked at home while they were asked for usual hours in 2001 and 2004. The 2001 

and 2004 respondents were also given a choice of “it varies” as a possible response; therefore, it 

is not possible to determine a numerical measure of work hours for all respondents. 

ATUS and CPS Supplement Matched Data 

CPS Supplement respondents in 2004 who were in their 5th through 8th months in the 

May CPS were eligible for an ATUS interview in 2004. We are able to directly match 745 

nonfarm business employees who were in the same industry and occupation in both data sets, did 

not change employers between their last month in the CPS and their ATUS interview, and 

worked on their diary day.9

 

 From the directly matched respondents, there are 93 who reported that they brought 

work home in the CPS supplement, and 45 that brought work home on their ATUS diary day. 

However, there are definitely limitations associated with the matched data. Some respondents to 

the supplement questions answered that they did not do any work at home as part of their job, 

although their time diary clearly stated that they did some work at home. For example, of the 45 

 

8

 The 1997 CPS Supplement included a probing question later on in the survey asking for the existence of additional 

unpaid hours; however, it is unclear how this information may be appropriately analyzed. 9

 Of the 13,973 ATUS interviewed in 2004, 7,558 had a May CPS Supplement interview. Of these, 2,429 were

employed in both the ATUS and CPS. 

7
individuals who we observed bringing work home on their diary day, only 21 reported that they 

ever work at home in the CPS supplement. This may be because the nature of their job changed 

between the CPS Supplement and the ATUS interviews, which could have been anywhere from

two to five months apart. Alternatively, the CPS Supplement questions may have been 

misinterpreted by the respondents, or answers may be subject to proxy reporting bias. From the 

2004 directly matched data, we find that 70 percent of those who worked at home on their 

weekend/holiday diary day did not have a formal arrangement to be paid for work at home in the 

CPS Supplement. This suggests that most employees who worked at home on the weekend are 

not home-based or occasional telecommuters. 

IV. Who is Bringing Work Home? 

Nonfarm business employees do, in fact, bring work home from the workplace. From 

the 2004 ATUS diaries, we find that although 84 percent of nonfarm business employees who 

worked on their diary day worked exclusively in a workplace, 9 percent brought some of their 

work home, while 3 percent worked exclusively at home during the week (Figure 1).10 The 2004 

CPS Supplement data show that approximately 12 percent of nonfarm business employees do 

some work at home (Figure 1). The CPS supplement specifically asked those who do work at 

home whether they bring work home; 8 percent of employees reported bringing some work home 

in 2004, while 4 percent reported that they had a formal arrangement to be paid for work 

conducted at home. The shares of those who bring work home in the ATUS and in the CPS 

 

10 The “other” category in Figure 1 consists of those who work at locations other than home or the workplace, such 

as a restaurant or someone else’s home, or those who combine other locations with the workplace. The ATUS does 

not ask for secondary activity, except for secondary childcare. Therefore, if a respondent reports commuting to 

work, there are recorded as commuting and not working. 

8
Supplement are surprisingly similar.11 Throughout the paper, all ATUS estimates have been 

weighted using the ATUS respondent final weight.12 All CPS Supplement estimates have been 

weighted using the work schedules supplement weight. 

The main reason reported in the CPS supplement for bringing work home was to finish 

up on work not completed at the usual workplace (Table 1).13 The second reason most 

frequently sited for working at home was that it was the nature of the job. Five percent of 

workers specifically reported that they work at home to coordinate their work schedule with 

personal or family needs. This is supported by ATUS data that shows eight percent of 

individuals who bring work home in the ATUS worked at home in the presence of at least one of 

their children in 2003. 

Frequency of Bringing Work Home 

From the ATUS data, we find that those who bring work home are roughly divided 

proportionally between weekday and weekend diaries (about 70 percent have a weekday diary 

day and 30 percent have weekend diary days). Among those who bring work home on a 

weekday, we find that more employees bring work home in the middle of the week than on 

Mondays and Fridays. Working at home is roughly divided evenly between Saturdays and 

Sundays among those who bring work home on weekends. Table 2 presents the proportion of 

nonfarm business employees who bring work home by what time of day they conduct work at 

home. On weekdays, we find that the majority of those who bring work home do their work at 

home in the evenings. In 2003, 60 percent did some work at home between 6 P.M. and 12 A.M. 

During the conventional working hours of 8 A.M. to 4 P.M., 32 percent did some work at home. 

 

11 The distributions of work locations for other years are not statistically different from the 2004 results. 12 For 2003, the ATUS created updated final weights (TU04FWGT) to allow for pooling data across years. 13 The 1997 CPS Supplement reasons for work at home are not comparable and, therefore, not reported here. 

9
A smaller percentage (20 percent) did some work at home between 6 A.M. and 8 A.M before 

heading to their primary workplace. This work reportedly done outside traditional working 

hours suggests that workers are either bringing extra work home or shifting the timing of their 

work. On weekends, a greater percentage of work at home is done during the daytime hours (54 

percent in 2005) while less is done in the evenings (45 percent in 2005). 

Table 3 presents the proportion of nonfarm business employees who bring work home by 

the specific number of minutes worked at home. We find that the amount of work done at home 

is economically significant. Of those who bring work home, 43 percent worked more than one 

hour at home on their 2003 diary day. Twenty-two percent of those who bring work home

worked at home for more than two hours, while 17 percent worked at home for less than 15 

minutes. 

Among the 8 percent of nonfarm business employees who bring work home according to 

the CPS Supplement, we find that over 70 percent report working at home at least once a week, 

about 12 - 13 percent work from home at least every two weeks, 10 percent at least once a month 

and 5 - 6 percent less than once a month (Table 4). When asked to report hours worked at home, 

roughly 31 percent of nonfarm business employees who bring work home did not report how 

many hours they worked at home but rather that their hours at home varied in 2004, 23 percent 

reported working 1 - 2 hours per week at home, 14 percent reported working 3 - 4 hours per 

week at home, 12 percent reported 5 - 6 hours per week at home, and the remaining respondents 

reported anywhere from 8 - 60 hours per week at home. 

10
Characteristics of Those Who Bring Work Home 

In Table 5, we examine the characteristics of nonfarm business employees in the ATUS, 

comparing those who bring work home from the workplace with those who work exclusively in 

the workplace.14 In all years, employees who brought work home from the workplace were more 

likely to be older, white15, married, have at least a bachelor’s degree, and work in a management 

or professional occupation compared with employees who worked exclusively in the workplace. 

They were less likely to be black, Hispanic, work part time, or paid hourly. For example, among 

nonfarm business employees in 2005, 56 percent of those who brought work home held at least a 

bachelor’s degree while only 21 percent of those who worked exclusively in the workplace held 

at least a bachelor’s degree. Of those who brought work home, only 29 percent reported being 

paid hourly in 2003, while 66 percent of nonfarm employees who worked exclusively in the 

workplace were paid hourly. Contrary to popular perceptions, not all work brought home is done 

by white-collar office workers. For example, among nonfarm business employees who brought 

work home in 2005, 9 percent worked in construction and maintenance occupations. 

In Table 6, we use the 2001 and 2004 CPS supplement data to examine the characteristics 

of nonfarm business employees, comparing those who bring work home with those who do no 

work at home.16 In both years, employees who brought work home were more likely to be older, 

white, married, have at least a bachelor’s degree, have a child, and work in a management or 

professional occupation compared with those employees who do not bring work home. They 

were less likely to be female, black, Hispanic, or work part time. 

 

14 Results are presented for combined weekday and weekend diaries. The analysis was also conducted separately for 

weekday and weekends, and the results are similar. 15 The “other race” category listed in Table 5 includes individuals of mixed-race categories, Asians, American 

Indians, Alaskan Natives, and Hawaiian/Pacific Islanders. 

16 Although we include 1997 information in our measurement discussion later, the surveys are not comparable to the 

time period investigated in the ATUS nor are the industry and occupation variables comparable. Therefore, we do

not include 1997 estimates in the descriptive analysis. 

11
Regression Analysis 

We estimated a multinomial logit model in order to determine the demographic and job 

characteristics of employees associated with bringing work home, compared with working 

exclusively in the workplace using the ATUS sample and compared with doing no work at home 

using the CPS Supplement. A third alternative in this model, but not discussed here, includes 

those who work in other locations on all diary days and exclusively at home on weekday diary 

days when using the ATUS and includes work in other locations and paid work at home when 

using the CPS Supplement. Independent variables in the model include educational degree 

attainment indicators, demographic characteristics (gender, age and age squared, indicators for 

race, Hispanic ethnicity, indicators for married or divorced, indicators for age of youngest child – 

infant, preschooler, elementary school student, or adolescent, and indicators for the interaction of 

these latter child variables with gender), job characteristics (part-time indicator, hourly indicator 

for ATUS sample17, five occupation indicators, and ten industry indicators), and geographic 

characteristics (three region indicators), as well as a weekend diary indicator and a year indicator 

for the ATUS sample. 

We estimated this model first using the pooled 2003-2005 ATUS data. We also 

examined salaried employees separately, because they are more likely to bring work home and 

more likely to have unmeasured hours worked.18 Table 7 reports the marginal effects and

standard errors from these estimations for all employees and then for salaried employees only. 

 

17 We do not include an hourly indicator in the CPS Supplement, because pay status is only collected in the outgoing 

rotation. 18 In the matched data, among nonfarm business employees that were observed to bring work home in the ATUS 

and reported that they took work home in the CPS Supplement, 86 percent were salaried employees. 

12
Next, we estimated the model using CPS supplement data for 2001 and 2004 sequentially. Table 

8 presents the marginal effects and standard errors from these estimations. 

Holding all else equal, overall results from both data sets indicate that highly-educated 

employees are much more likely to bring work home than less-educated employees, black 

employees are less likely to bring work home than white employees, and Hispanic employees are 

less likely to bring work home than non-Hispanic employees. We also find that females are less 

likely to bring work home than males, except in the 2001 CPS Supplement; although, the 

magnitude of these gender effects is small compared with the magnitude of the education effects. 

It is also possible that these gender differences may actually capture occupation and industry 

differences in jobs held by gender that are not specified in our model. Several more detailed

occupation groups, such as management and computer and mathematical science, have a high 

percentage of employees who bring work home, are male-dominated occupations, and constitute 

a large percentage of total employees in our sample. In the ATUS, those paid hourly are seven 

percent less likely to bring work home than salaried employees. 

From the CPS supplement, we find that older employees are more likely to bring work 

home than younger employees. We also find some small differences in the probability of 

bringing work home between those who have children and those who do not. In the CPS 

Supplement in both 2001 and 2004, we find that men with a child aged 0-5 are more likely to 

bring work home than men without children; in 2001, fathers whose youngest child was 

elementary school-aged were also more likely to bring work home than males without children. 

In the ATUS only, mothers of preschooler and elementary school-aged children are more likely 

to bring work home than women without children. This suggests that some parents may bring 

work home to better balance work and family responsibilities when the children are young. In 

13
the CPS Supplement, we also find that mothers of infants are less likely to bring work home than 

fathers of infants. It is possible that mothers, as opposed to fathers, may choose not to bring 

work home because they traditionally spend more time on childcare and household production 

than their male spouses. 

V. Do Those Who Bring Work Home Work Longer Hours? 

We are interested in determining whether those who bring work home work longer hours, 

or whether they are simply shifting the location of work. Using the 2003-2005 ATUS data, we 

find different results for weekday diaries compared with weekend/holiday diaries. For 

respondents who bring work home on a weekday, we find that their daily hours worked are 

greater than the hours worked by those who work exclusively in a workplace; daily hours are 11 

percent greater in 2003, 6 percent greater in 2004, and 13 percent greater in 2005. However, we 

also find that daily hours worked at the workplace by those who bring work home on a 

weekday are less than the daily hours worked at the workplace for those who work exclusively 

at a workplace on their weekday diary day — 10 percent less in 2003, 11 percent less in 2004, 

and 9 percent less in 2005 (Table 9). Thus, those who bring work home on a weekday are 

shifting some hours of work from their workplace to their home, but they work more hours in 

total on their diary day. 

Because we only observe a single diary day, we defined those who do any work at home

on a weekend/holiday diary day as those who bring work home. For those who work at home on 

a weekend or holiday, we find that their daily hours worked are significantly less than the hours 

worked by those who work exclusively in the workplace. The daily hours for those who bring 

work home on a weekend/holiday are 2-3 hours per day compared with a 7-hour work day by 

14
those who work exclusively at the workplace. Although some of the bring-work-home weekend 

respondents may be home-based workers, their hours at home are quite similar to the 1-2 hours 

worked at home by weekday respondents who bring work home from the workplace. 

In order to determine whether workers who bring work home on their diary day work 

more hours in general than do those who work exclusively in a workplace and are not completely 

off-setting hours at home on their diary day with fewer hours on another day during the week, we 

compare each group’s CPS actual average weekly hours (Table 10).19 Using either weekday or 

weekend/holiday diary data, we find that those who bring work home from their workplace 

reported significantly higher average weekly hours than those who work exclusively in a 

workplace. From the weekday diaries, average weekly hours for those who bring work home are 

9-12 percent greater than those who work exclusively in the workplace. From the 

weekend/holiday diaries, the average weekly hours of those who bring work home are 15-19 

percent greater than those who work exclusively in the workplace. This provides additional 

evidence that those who work at home on weekends are bringing work home from the 

workplace. Recall that daily hours worked for these respondents were approximately 2 hours per 

weekend day, while their average weekly hours are over 42 hours per week. Assuming a five 

day work week, this suggests that the average daily hours for those who are working at home on 

a weekend should be about 8 hours per day. Thus, their daily and weekly hours closely resemble 

those of respondents who bring work home on weekdays. This suggests that combining 

weekday and weekend reports to calculate the share of workers who bring work home and their 

average hours worked is appropriate. 

 

19 To analyze hours worked, we further restrict the sample to those who have the same employer, occupation and 

usual duties as they reported to the CPS two to five months prior. 

15
Using the CPS supplement data, we also find that those who bring work home have 

statistically significant higher average weekly hours (20-21 percent higher) than those who do no 

work from home (Table 11). We also report separate estimates for those who work at home at 

least once a week because their hours worked at home should always be included in CPS average 

weekly hours reports whereas only some of the hours from workers who do infrequent work at 

home will be captured in CPS average weekly hours. The subgroup of employees who bring 

work home at least once a week have slightly higher average weekly hours in 2001 and 2004 

than all employees who bring work home. We do not report results for the 1997 CPS 

Supplement since respondents were not asked for frequency of work at home but only whether 

they worked at home last week, which would capture those working at home at least once a week 

and some of those who work less than once a week at home. 

The general results from the two data sources are the same; those who bring work home 

do in fact work longer hours. In addition, both data sources show very little change in average 

weekly hours over time. We will show these results also hold for nonproduction/supervisory 

employees and production/nonsupervisory employees separately.20

VI. Use of Hours Data in U.S. Productivity Measurement 

Labor productivity measures the difference between output and hours growth, and 

reflects many sources, including increases in the quantities of nonlabor inputs (i.e., capital 

services, fuels, other intermediate materials, and purchased services), changes in technology, 

economies of scale, changes in management techniques, and changes in the skills of the labor 

 

20 In goods-producing industries, workers are divided into production and nonproduction workers. Nonproduction

workers include professional specialty and technical workers; executive, administrative, and managerial workers;

sales workers, and administrative support workers, including clerical. In service-producing industries, workers are 

divided into supervisory and nonsupervisory workers. Supervisory workers include all executives and

administrative and managerial workers 

16
force. The BLS calculates labor productivity in the nonfarm business sector by combining real 

output from the National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA) produced by the Bureau of 

Economic Analysis (BEA) with quarterly measures prepared by the BLS Office of Productivity 

and Technology (OPT) of hours worked for all persons. The primary source of data used to 

construct hours worked measures for productivity purposes is the monthly payroll survey of 

establishments conducted by the BLS Current Employment Statistics program (CES).21 The 

CES collects data on employment for all employees and average weekly hours paid for 

production workers in goods industries and for nonsupervisory workers in service industries 

monthly. The data represent employment and average hours paid for the pay period including 

the 12th day of the month.22 CES average weekly hours paid are adjusted to hours at work using 

an hours-worked to hours-paid ratio estimated from the National Compensation Survey (NCS). 

This adjustment ensures that changes in vacation, holiday, and sick pay, which are viewed as 

changes in labor costs, do not affect hours growth.23 Production/nonsupervisory hours are 

calculated as: 

AWH * N * 52 P

M

P

 (1)

where AWHP

M represents measured average weekly hours for production/nonsupervisory 

workers obtained from CES hours and adjusted by the hours-worked to hours-paid ratio and an 

 

21 The CES samples 400,000 nonfarm establishments, more than six times the 60,000 households sampled in the 

CPS. In addition, the CES is benchmarked annually to levels based on administrative records of employees covered

by state unemployment insurance tax records. There is no direct benchmark for CPS employment data. Adjustments 

to the CPS underlying population base are made annually using intercensal estimates and every ten years using the 

decennial census. Also, establishment hours data are more consistent with the measures of output used to produce 

productivity measures; output data are based on data collected from establishments. In addition, establishment data 

provide reliable reporting and coding on industries and thus are well-suited for producing industry-level measures. 

Measures for industries based on household reports tend to produce industry estimates with considerable variance,

even in a survey as large as the CPS. Thus, the BLS’s official measures by industry come from establishment 

surveys wherever possible. 22 The CES program began collecting data on earnings and hours for all employees in September 2005. An

experimental series including these new data is available at www.bls.gov/ces/cesaepp.htm. 23 Prior to 2000, the annual Hours at Work Survey was used. 

17
adjustment to remove nonprofit institutions, and NP is the employment of nonfarm business 

production/nonsupervisory employees. 

Because official hours estimates are not available from the CES, the BLS estimates 

average weekly hours of nonproduction/supervisory employees.24 Data from the BLS’ 

household survey, the CPS, are used to construct a ratio of the average weekly hours worked by 

nonproduction/supervisory employees relative to the average weekly hours worked by 

production/nonsupervisory employees. Together with CES hours and employment data, this 

ratio is used to calculate the total hours worked by nonproduction/supervisory employees. 

Nonproduction/supervisory hours are calculated as: 

* * N * 52

AWH

AWH AWH AWH CPS NP

P

CPS

M NP

P

M

NP = (2) 

where AWHNP

CPS and AWHPCPS represent CPS measures of average weekly hours for 

nonproduction/supervisory and production/nonsupervisory employees respectively, and NNP is 

the employment of nonfarm business nonproduction/supervisory employees. Average weekly 

hours for production/nonsupervisory employees and nonproduction/supervisory employees are 

constructed by OPT at the NAICS major industry group level and then aggregated. Total hours 

for all persons in the nonfarm business sector are the sum of production/nonsupervisory 

employee hours, nonproduction/supervisory employee hours, and hours worked by the 

unincorporated self-employed, unpaid family workers and employees of government enterprises. 

Average weekly hours for the unincorporated self-employed, unpaid family workers and 

 

24 In August 2004, BLS introduced this new method of constructing estimates of hours for nonproduction and 

supervisory workers. See Eldridge, Manser, and Otto (2004). 

18
employees of government enterprises are taken directly from the CPS; remaining data are 

obtained from various sources.25 

Some critics of official productivity measures have suggested that IT innovations have 

allowed workers the flexibility to work outside the traditional workplace and that these hours are 

not properly captured in official BLS productivity measures.26 This criticism is typically

directed toward the quarterly labor productivity in the nonfarm business sector. It is important to 

note that an underestimation of hours worked affects measures of productivity growth only if

unmeasured hours grow differently from measured hours and affect a significant portion of the 

working population. Eldridge (2004) found that a hypothetical hours series constructed by 

combining CPS average weekly hours and CES employment data produced slightly higher levels

of hours, but hours showed a comparable trend from 2000-2003. 

VII. Are Hours of Work Brought Home Measured? 

Hours worked are constructed separately for production/nonsupervisory employees, 

nonproduction/supervisory employees, and nonemployees.27 Figure 2 shows each group’s share 

of nonfarm business sector hours worked and employment. Production/nonsupervisory 

employees account for the majority of all nonfarm business sector hours (69 percent), while 

nonemployees account for the smallest share of hours (12 percent). As previously mentioned, an

analysis of bringing work home among nonemployees is beyond the scope of this paper. 

 

25 Employment counts for employees in agricultural services, forestry and fishing come from the BLS’s 202

program, based on administrative records from the unemployment insurance system. The number of employees of 

government enterprises comes from the BEA. 26 Steven Roach (1998) argued that many white collar workers are working longer workdays than the official U.S. 

data show, as a result of the new portable technologies of the information age — laptops, cellular telephones, home

fax machines, and beepers. 27 We use the term nonemployees in this study to represent the unincorporated self-employed, unpaid family

workers and government enterprise workers. 

19
 Production and Nonsupervisory Employees 

Using the 2003-2005 ATUS data, we find that approximately 85-86 percent of 

production/nonsupervisory employees who work on their diary day worked exclusively in the 

workplace, while 6 percent brought work home from the workplace in 2003, 8 percent brought 

work home in 2004, and 7 percent brought work home in 2005 (Table 12). We find that those 

who bring work home from their workplace report higher average weekly hours than those who 

work exclusively in a workplace; 3 percent higher in 2003, 7 percent higher in 2004, and 14 

percent higher in 2005. 

As mentioned in section VI, the BLS constructs annual hours worked using hours paid 

data from the CES for production/nonsupervisory employees. If hours for those employees are 

understated it is only to the extent that hours worked at home are not captured in reported hours 

paid. 

The ATUS does not obtain information on whether work brought home is paid or unpaid. 

Therefore, to assess whether work that is brought home from the workplace is measured, we 

must make several assumptions. First, we assume that hours worked at the workplace are 

captured in reported hours paid and thus measured. Second, we assume that hourly workers are 

less likely to do unpaid work at home than salaried workers. The outgoing rotation cohort of the 

CPS Supplement indicates that over 81 percent of production/nonsupervisory workers who bring 

work home, without a formal arrangement to be paid, are not paid hourly. We find that 4 to 5 

percent of production/nonsupervisory workers were paid a salary and brought work home. 

Among these employees, we find that 16-19 percent of their weekday daily hours were worked 

at home. Among those who bring work home and are paid a salary, we find that average weekly

20
hours were 6 percent greater than those who worked exclusively in a workplace in 2003, 16 

percent greater in 2004 and 15 percent greater in 2005. 

Recall that the CPS supplement specifically asked respondents whether they were paid to 

work at home or whether they just took work home. The CPS Supplement data indicate that 

approximately 91-92 percent of production/nonsupervisory employees report no work at home 

(Table 13), while 3 percent of production/nonsupervisory employees report some paid work at 

home and roughly 5-6 percent indicate they were just bringing work home. About 4 percent 

indicate that they bring work home at least once a week. Thus, in any given CPS week, 

somewhere between 4-6 percent bring work home. Comparing average weekly hours for those 

who bring work home with those who do no work at home, we find that those who bring work 

home have statistically significant higher average weekly hours (17-18 percent higher) than those 

who do no work from home. These findings suggest that there may exist unmeasured hours for 

production/nonsupervisory employees who work outside the workplace. 

Nonproduction and Supervisory Employees

Among nonproduction/supervisory employees who worked on their diary day, roughly 

72-77 percent worked exclusively in a workplace on their diary day, while 12-16 percent brought 

work home from the workplace on their diary day (Table 14).28 As with the production/ 

nonsupervisory results, we find that those who bring work home from a workplace report higher 

average weekly hours than those who work exclusively in a workplace — 11 percent higher in 

2003, 12 percent higher in 2004, and 7 percent higher in 2005. The ATUS data indicate that 11-

14 percent of salaried nonproduction/supervisory employees brought work home. We find that 

13-16 percent of daily hours among salaried nonproduction/supervisory employees were worked 

 

28 Numbers do not sum to 100 since workers could work in other locations or exclusively at home. See footnote 9.

21
at home. For these workers, we also find that average weekly hours were 14 percent greater than 

those who worked exclusively in a workplace in 2003, 13 percent greater in 2004 and 11 percent 

greater in 2005. 

Using the CPS supplement, we find that approximately 73-74 percent of 

nonproduction/supervisory employees reported no work done at home (Table 15). About seven 

percent of nonproduction/supervisory employees reported doing some paid work at home and 

19-20 percent reported that they bring work home. Comparing average weekly hours for those 

who bring work home with those who do no work at home, we find that those who bring work 

home have significantly higher average weekly hours than those who do no work from home — 

15 percent greater in 1997 and 2001 and 13 percent greater in 2004. Although these findings 

suggest that there are hours that may not be reported as hours paid for nonproduction/supervisory 

employees who bring work home, it does not lead to the implication that hours are not measured 

since BLS hours for nonproduction/supervisory employees are not constructed using a series of 

hours paid for nonproduction/supervisory employees.29

Estimating the Percent of Unmeasured Hours 

A. Assuming Accurate Response to CPS 

If we think of the measured average weekly hours series as capturing a weighted average 

of the average weekly hours of those who do not bring work home, and the average weekly hours 

worked in a workplace of those who bring work home then the measured series can be written 

as: 

⎟

⎠

⎞ ⎜

⎝

⎛ = + γ

workplace

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

M AWH P w AWH w AWH ~ ~ (3) 

 

29 See equation (2).

22
where w~bwh and AWH~bwh represent the share of workers who do not bring work home and their 

average weekly hours respectively, and wbwh and AWHbwh represent the share of workers who 

bring work home and their average weekly hours respectively. By construction, w~bwh and wbwh

sum to one. Also, γP

workplace represents the percent of hours worked at a workplace by those who 

bring work home. 

Unmeasured hours worked per week for production/nonsupervisory employees are the 

hours worked at home by those who bring work home, or: 

 wbwh AWHbwh * γP

home (4)

where γP

home represents the percent of hours worked at home by those who bring work home, or 

1- γP

workplace. Dividing equation (4) by equation (3) and rearranging terms gives the unmeasured 

hours worked at home as a percent of measured hours for production/ nonsupervisory 

employees: 

γ

γ θ workplace

bwh P

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

P

P

w AWH

w AWH +

= ~ ~

home (5)

Recall that Frazis and Stewart (2004) found that ATUS and CPS hours reports for all workers in 

the reference week were similar in 2003. This suggests that workers accurately report all hours 

worked to the CPS; therefore, we can use CPS average weekly hours to estimate θP. Table 16 

presents the estimates of the percentage of unmeasured hours for production/nonsupervisory 

employees in each year, as well as the estimates for the components of equation (5). 

 The measured average weekly hours for nonproduction/supervisory employees are 

calculated by OPT as: 

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎦

⎤

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎣

⎡

AWH

AWH AWH CPS

P

CPS

M NP

P * (6)

23
Assuming that there is no bias in the ratio of average weekly hours worked by nonproduction/ 

supervisory employees relative to production/nonsupervisory employees, the percent of 

unmeasured hours for nonproduction/supervisory employees are the same as that of 

production/supervisory employees.30 According to ATUS data, approximately 0.8-0.9 percent 

of average weekly hours are unmeasured due to work brought home (Table 16). According to 

the CPS supplement, the percent of unmeasured hours is a bit larger (0.9-1.1 percent); although 

when we focus on those who bring work home at least once a week, the percent of unmeasured 

hours is 0.8 percent.31

B. Assuming Recall Bias in the CPS 

However, CPS respondents who bring work home may differ from the average CPS 

respondent and may be unable to accurately recall work done at home as suggested by 

inconsistencies in the directly matched data. If a recall bias among those who bring work home 

exists, then the nonproduction/supervisory to production/nonsupervisory hours ratio may be 

biased downward because nonproduction/supervisory employees are more likely to bring work 

home than production/supervisory employees. As an upper bound, we assume that none of the 

hours reported to the CPS include hours worked at home and thus we increase average weekly 

hours for those who bring work home to be equal to reported hours plus the hours worked at 

home. Because survey respondents should be better able to accurately recall events of the 

previous day than the previous week, we use ATUS data on the percent of hours worked at home 

 

30 CPS average weekly hours should include all hours worked regardless of location for both

nonproduction/supervisory employees and nonproduction/supervisory employees. Because this is a ratio, any 

survey effects will cancel out. 31 However, the quality of these additional hours at home may not be of the same quality as those worked in the 

workplace, especially if workers are doing secondary childcare while working at home. 

24
by those who bring work home on their diary day to estimate the modified average weekly 

hours.32 

Recall that measured average weekly hours from equation (3) include only average 

weekly hours worked in a workplace. Given the assumption of CPS recall bias among those who 

bring work home, the average weekly hours reported to the CPS also include only average 

weekly hours worked in the workplace. Therefore, we divide equation (4) by total reported CPS 

hours which are defined as: 

AWH (w AWH w AWH ) bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

CPS

P = + ~ ~ (7) 

Unmeasured hours worked at home as a percent of measured hours for production/ 

nonsupervisory employees assuming recall bias can be written as: 

1

~ ~

hom

+

=

w AWH

w AWH

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

e

r P

P

γ θ

 (8)

Given the recall bias assumption, the percent of unmeasured hours for 

nonproduction/supervisory employees is no longer equal to the percent of unmeasured hours for 

production/nonsupervisory employees. Unmeasured hours for nonproduction/supervisory 

employees can be written as: 

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎦

⎤

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎣

⎡

−

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎦

⎤

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎣

⎡

⎟

⎠

⎞ ⎜

⎝

⎛

+

+

+

AWH

AWH AWH

AWH w AWH

AWH w AWH

AWH CPS

P

CPS

CPS NP

e P

P

bwh

P

bwh

P

CPS

P

e

NP

bwh

NP

bwh

NP

CPS

r NP

P

CPS

P 1 *

hom *

hom *

* *

γ

γ θ (9) 

Dividing equation (9) by equation (7) and rearranging terms gives the percent of 

unmeasured hours for nonproduction/ supervisory employees given a recall bias as: 

 

32 Information from the CPS Supplement is not used because respondents were directly asked how many hours they 

usually work at home and how many hours they usually work in total in the same survey; therefore, these responses 

should be consistent and we would be unable to determine the correct percentage of hours worked at home if there is 

a recall bias. 

25
1

1 *

1 *

1 *

hom

hom

−

+

+

= +

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎥

⎦

⎤

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎢

⎣

⎡

⎟

⎟

⎟

⎠

⎞

⎜

⎜

⎜

⎝

⎛

⎟

⎟

⎟

⎠

⎞

⎜

⎜

⎜

⎝

⎛

⎟

⎠

⎞ ⎜

⎝

⎛

γ

γ

θ θ e

CPS P

P

bwh

bwh P

P

e

CPS NP

NP

bwh

bwh NP

NP

r

P rNP

AWH

AWH

w

AWH

AWH

w (10) 

Table 17 presents the estimates of the percent of unmeasured average weekly hours for 

production/nonsupervisory employees, nonproduction/supervisory employees, and all employees 

given the assumption of recall bias in each year.33 For production/nonsupervisory employees, 

unmeasured hours are 0.8 to 0.9 percent, roughly equal to measures with no recall bias. For 

nonproduction/supervisory employees, unmeasured hours are significantly higher (1.9-2.2 

percent). However, total measured employee hours are the sum of the weighted share of hours of 

production/nonsupervisory employees and nonproduction/supervisory employees. From Figure 

2, we know that production/nonsupervisory employees account for the majority of all hours 

worked, thus unmeasured hours by this group will be more heavily weighted. Assuming that 

CPS respondents who bring work home can not accurately account for hours worked at home, 

we find that 1.1 percent of hours may be missed. 

Our analysis using both the ATUS and the CPS supplement suggests unmeasured hours 

of nonfarm business employees may range from 0.8 to 1.1 percent. We next examine whether 

unmeasured hours are increasing over time. 

Unmeasured Hours Growth 

Using the percent of unmeasured hours estimated above, we construct an hours series for 

all employees in the nonfarm business sector and add to this the hours worked by the 

 

33 For the 1997 CPS Supplement, we use actual hours worked last week and all hours worked at home last week to 

calculate the percent of hours worked at home. Due to questionnaire differences, we use usual hours worked at

home and usual hours worked in total for those respondents who do not report that their hours vary for the 2001 and 

2004 CPS Supplement. 

26
unincorporated self-employed, unpaid family workers and employees of government enterprises, 

as measured by OPT. Table 18 compares the growth in measured hours worked for all persons 

in the nonfarm business sector with the growth in each of our adjusted series (assuming no recall 

bias in the CPS and recall bias). Official productivity growth statistics are published to the first 

decimal place. We find that the growth in the ATUS-adjusted series is slightly faster than the 

growth in the BLS measured hours series from 2003 to 2004, but slightly slower in 2004-2005, 

using the no recall bias assumption. Over the two year period from 2003-2005 we find a 

negligible downward bias in measured hours growth. Assuming recall bias, we find a small 

upward bias in the measured hours growth that would have no affect on official productivity 

growth statistics. The CPS Supplement-adjusted series from 1997 to 2001 grows slightly slower 

than the BLS measured series, but there is very little difference between the two series for the 

2001-2004 and 1997-2004 periods. Again, over all years the differences are too small to affect 

the official productivity growth statistics. Therefore, any potential bias in hours levels resulting 

from unmeasured hours worked at home is not a significant source of productivity growth. 

VIII. Conclusion 

In this paper, we used both the ATUS and May CPS Work Schedules and Work at Home

Supplements to determine whether hours worked by nonfarm business employees were 

understated and increased between 1997 and 2005 because of unreported hours worked at home. 

The main advantage of using the CPS Supplement is that we can determine whether work done 

at home is paid. The main advantages of the ATUS are that we can observe when during the day 

the work is being performed at home and get a more accurate measure of the number of hours 

worked at home. 

27
According to the 2003-2005 ATUS data and the CPS Supplement, 8-9 percent of 

nonfarm business employees brought some of their work home from their primary workplace. A 

majority of CPS supplement respondents indicated that they did work at home in order to finish 

or catch up on work. We find evidence that suggests workers bring work home at least in part to 

better balance work and family responsibilities. We find that men and women of young children 

are more likely to bring work home than those without children. In addition, 8 percent of bringwork-home workers reported a child in their care while working at home in 2003. Five percent 

of respondents to the CPS supplement directly indicated that they do work at home to better 

balance work and family responsibilities. Results from a multinomial logit model also indicate 

that highly-educated, salaried workers are much more likely to bring work home than their lesseducated, hourly counterparts. 

From both data sets we find that those who bring work home have higher average weekly 

hours than those who work exclusively in a workplace. From the ATUS data, we find that total 

daily hours at the workplace are lower for those who bring work home than for those who work 

exclusively in the workplace. Thus, it does appear that those who bring work home shift some

work from their workplace to their home, yet work more hours overall. 

The data suggests that there may exist a 0.8 - 1.1 percent downwards bias in measured 

hours. Although both data sources suggest some hours worked at home are not captured by 

official hours level series, when the official series is augmented to include these unmeasured 

hours there is very little change in the hours trends. Unmeasured hours worked at home have 

less than a 0.1 percent affect on productivity trends. 

28
REFERENCES 

Callister, Paul, and Sylvia Dixon. 2001. “New Zealanders’ Work Time and Home Work 

Patterns: Evidence from the Time Use Survey” New Zealand Department of Labour Occasional 

Paper No. 5. 

Eldridge, Lucy P., Marilyn E. Manser and Phyllis F. Otto. 2004. “Alternative Measures of 

Supervisory Employee Hours and Productivity Growth,” Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 127, No.4 

(April), pp. 9-28. 

Eldridge, Lucy P. 2004. “Hours Measures for Productivity Measurement and National 

Accounting,” presented to Paris Group on Measuring Hours of Work (September). 

Frazis, Harley, and Jay Stewart. 2004. “What Can Time-Use Data Tell Us About Hours of 

Work?” Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 127, No. 12 (December), pp. 3-9. 

Hamermesh, Daniel S. 1990. “Shirking or Productive Schmoozing: Wages and the Allocation 

of Time at Work.” Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 43, No. 3, pp. 121S-133S. 

Jacobs, Jerry A. 1998. “Measuring Time at Work: Are Self-Reports Accurate?” Monthly Labor 

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Oettinger, Gerald. 2004. “The Growth in Home-Based Wage and Salary Employment in the 

United States, 1980-2000: How Much and Why?” Presentation at the Society of Labor 

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May1, 2004). 

Pabilonia, Sabrina Wulff. 2006. “Working at Home: An Analysis of Telecommuting in Canada”, 

Unpublished paper, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. 

Polivka, Anne E., and Jennifer M. Rothgeb. 1993. “Redesigning the CPS Questionnaire.” 

Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 16, No. 9 (September), pp. 10-28. 

Roach, Stephen S. 1998. “The Boom for Whom: Revisiting America’s Technology Paradox.” 

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, Special Economic Study, January 9. 

Robinson, John, and Ann Bostrom. 1994. “The Overestimated Workweek? What Time Diary 

Measures Suggest.” Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 117, No. 8 (August), pp. 11-23. 

 

Schroeder, Christine, and Ronald S. Warren. 2004. “The Effect of Home-Based Work on 

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Wight, Vanessa R., and Suzanne M. Bianchi. 2004. “Women’s Home-Based Work Patterns: 

Findings from the 2001 Current Population Survey”. Unpublished paper, University of 

Maryland. 

29
Figure 1: Percent of Nonfarm Business Employees by Work Location

CPS Supplement 2004

8% 4%

88%

No Work at Home

Bring Work Home

Work at Home (formal arrangement)

ATUS 2004

84%

3%

9%

5%

Workplace Only

Bring Work Home

Home Only (weekdays)

Other

Note: ATUS respondents represent only those who work on their diary day. The other category consists of

those who work at locations other than home or the workplace or those who combine other locations with the 

workplace. 

CPS Supplement respondents represent those who answered the question "As part of this job, do you do any of

your work at home?"

Figure 2. Percent of Nonfarm Business Sector Hours and Employment, 

 by Type of Worker: 2004 

69%

19%

12%

Production and Nonsupervisory

Nonproduction and Supervisory

Nonemployees

71%

17%

12%

 Hours Worked Employment

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 

30
Table 1. Proportion of Nonfarm Business Employees Who Bring Work Home, 

by Reason for Work at Home (CPS Supplement) 

 2001 2004

Finish or catch up on work 0.59 0.56 

Business is conducted from home 0.04 0.04 

Nature of the job 0.24 0.29 

Coordinate work schedule w/ personal or family 

needs 0.05 0.05

Reduce commuting time or expense 0.01 0.01 

Local transportation or pollution control program 0.00 0.00 

Some other reason 0.06 0.06

Number of observations 2,895 3,143 

Note: Proportions are weighted to account for sampling design.

Table 2. Proportion of Nonfarm Business Employees Who Bring Work Home, 

by Time of Day Working at Home (ATUS) 

Weekdays Weekends

Time of Day 2003 2004 2005 2003 2004 2005 

12AM-6AM 0.11 0.10 0.09 0.08 0.07 0.04

6AM-8AM 0.20 0.22 0.23 0.10 0.10 0.10

8AM-4PM 0.32 0.33 0.29 0.49 0.52 0.54

4PM-6PM 0.19 0.22 0.16 0.25 0.20 0.28

6PM-12AM 0.60 0.59 0.66 0.51 0.55 0.45

Number of observations 246 175 155 308 228 201 

Note: Proportions are weighted to account for sampling design. Numbers are rounded and do not sum to 100

because a worker could be working in more than one time period. 

31
Table 3. Proportion of Nonfarm Business Employees Who Bring Work Home, 

 by Minutes Worked at Home (ATUS) 

Minutes per day 2003 2004 2005

≤15 0.17 0.20 0.23

16-30 0.17 0.18 0.18

31-60 0.23 0.25 0.22

61-120 0.21 0.17 0.14

121-180 0.09 0.09 0.11

181-240 0.04 0.05 0.05

241+ 0.09 0.06 0.07

Number of observations 554 403 356 

Note: Proportions are weighted to account for sampling design. Numbers are rounded. 

Table 4. Proportion of Nonfarm Business Employees Who Bring Work Home, 

by Frequency (CPS Supplement)

 2001 2004

At least once a week 0.71 0.73 

At least every two weeks 0.13 0.12 

At least once a month 0.10 0.10 

Less than once a month 0.06 0.05 

Number of observations 2,889 3,129 

Note: Proportions are weighted to account for sampling design. 

32
Table 5. Means and Proportions of Nonfarm Business Employees in the ATUS, 

comparing Bring Work Home with Workplace Only 

2003 2004 2005

Bring

work

home 

Workplace 

Only

Bring 

work

home 

Workplace 

Only

Bring 

work

home 

Workplace 

Only

Female .43 .40 .38 .43 .31 .44

Age 41.79

(0.59) 

38.27 

(0.27) 

42.00 

(0.65) 

38.77 

(0.32) 

41.82 

(1.17) 

38.41 

(0.35) 

White .85 .84 .87 .84 .86 .84

Black .05 .11 .06 .11 .06 .11

Other race .09 .05 .06 .05 .08 .05

Hispanic .05 .15 .06 .15 .05 .17

Single .20 .35 .21 .33 .26 .34

Married .68 .54 .70 .55 .64 .53

Divorced .12 .11 .09 .12 .12 .13

Part time .16 .18 .14 .18 .11 .16

Paid hourly .29 .66 .33 .66 .25 .67 

EDUCATION

High school dropout .04 .16 .03 .15 .05 .15 

High school degree .19 .34 .19 .35 .12 .35 

Some college .25 .28 .27 .29 .27 .28 

Bachelor’s degree .33 .16 .34 .16 .38 .15 

Advanced degree .20 .05 .17 .06 .18 .06 

YOUNGEST CHILD IN THE HOME

No children .55 .64 .54 .63 .75 .74

Infant .08 .07 .09 .07 .05 .09

Preschooler .13 .10 .12 .11 .10 .10

Elementary student .13 .09 .12 .09 .11 .08

Adolescent .11 .10 .13 .10 .10 .10

OCCUPATIONS

Management and professional .56 .27 .48 .28 .53 .25 

Service .07 .16 .08 .17 .05 .16

Sales and office .26 .26 .29 .25 .28 .29 

Farming, fishing, and forestry .00 .00 .00 .00 .00 .00

Construction and maintenance .05 .12 .08 .11 .09 .12 

Production, transportation, & 

material moving 

.06 .20 .06 .18 .04 .19

INDUSTRY

Mining .00 .00 .00 .01 .01 .01

Construction .05 .08 .07 .08 .06 .09

Manufacturing .19 .19 .14 .19 .13 .19

Wholesale and retail trade .15 .20 .20 .19 .17 .20 

Transportation and utilities .05 .05 .04 .05 .04 .06

Information .06 .03 .08 .03 .06 .03

Financial activities .10 .08 .16 .10 .14 .08

Professional and business

services 

.17 .11 .13 .10 .19 .10

Educational and health services .15 .12 .10 .12 .10 .12 

Leisure and hospitality .06 .10 .05 .10 .06 .10

Other services .02 .04 .02 .04 .04 .03 

Weekend .24 .12 .23 .12 .32 .11

Number of Observations 554 3,746 403 2,466 356 2,359

Note: Sampling weights are used to account for survey design. Standard errors are in parentheses.

33
Table 6. Means and Proportions of Nonfarm Business Employees in CPS Supplement, 

comparing Bring Work Home with No Work at Home 

2001 2004

Bring home 

work 

No work at

home 

Bring home 

work 

No work at

home 

Female .39 .45 .38 .45

Age 40.96

(0.22) 

37.48 

(.09) 

42.48 

(0.26) 

38.04 

(0.09) 

White .90 .83 .88 .81

Black .06 .12 .05 .12

Other race .05 .05 .07 .07

Hispanic1 .04 .14 .05 .16

Single .18 .33 .19 .35

Married .70 .54 .70 .52

Divorced .12 .13 .11 .13

Part-time

2 .06 .18 .07 .19

EDUCATION

High school dropout .01 .17 .02 .16

High school degree .15 .36 .12 .35

Some college .23 .29 .23 .30

Bachelor’s degree .41 .15 .39 .15

Advanced degree .20 .04 .24 .04

YOUNGEST CHILD IN THE HOME

No children .55 .68 .60 .68

Infant .08 .06 .08 .06

Preschooler .13 .09 .11 .09

Elementary student .11 .08 .09 .08

Adolescent .13 .09 .12 .09

OCCUPATIONS

Management and professional .56 .18 .38 .16 

Service .11 .06 .03 .19

Sales and office .13 .05 .25 .29

Farming, fishing, and forestry .05 .01 .00 .00

Construction and maintenance .02 .07 .03 .11 

Production, transportation, & material moving .01 .01 .02 .19 

INDUSTRY

Mining .01 01 .00 .01

Construction .01 .01 .05 .08

Manufacturing .04 .07 .15 .17

Wholesale and retail trade .11 .13 .16 .20

Transportation and utilities .07 .08 .03 .05

Information .03 .05 .05 .03

Financial activities .03 .02 .16 .08

Professional and business services .01 .01 .20 .10

Educational and health services .08 .05 .15 .12

Leisure and hospitality .10 .23 .03 .12

Other services .16 .07 .01 .04

Number of Observations 2,908 30,124 3,160 34,389

Note: Sampling weights are used to account for survey design. Standard errors are in parentheses.

1. Hispanic proportions for 2001 are based upon 32,716 non-missing observations. 

2. Part-time proportions for 2001 are based upon 30,688 non-missing observations on hours worked per week. 

34
Table 7. Marginal Effects of Select Covariates on the Probability of Bringing Work Home from 

Multinomial Logit Model Using the ATUS (Comparison group = Work Exclusively in a Workplace)

All employees Salaried Employees 

Female -0.029***

(0.012) 

-0.047***

(0.014) 

Age -0.000

(0.002) 

-0.001

(0.003) 

Age squared/1000 0.015 

(0.027) 

0.023 

(0.035) 

Black -0.034***

(0.012) 

-0.045***

(0.014) 

Other race 

0.016 

(0.018) 

0.046 

(0.029) 

Hispanic -0.051***

(0.010) 

-0.055***

(0.014) 

Married 0.012 

(0.011) 

0.006 

(0.016) 

Divorced 0.020 

(0.015) 

0.028 

(0.022) 

High school degree 

0.020 

(0.025) 

0.091*

(0.046) 

Some college

0.065** 

(0.032) 

0.132** 

(0.056) 

Bachelor's degree 0.110***

(0.040) 

0.202***

(0.070) 

Advanced degree 

0.140***

(0.048) 

0.251***

(0.084) 

Part time -0.008

(0.012) 

0.027 

(0.025) 

Paid hourly -0.074***

(0.010) - 

Youngest child aged 0-2 0.008 

(0.019) 

0.007 

(0.041) 

Youngest child aged 0-2 * female -0.012

(0.025) 

0.017 

(0.041) 

Youngest child aged 3-5 0.012 

(0.015) 

0.019 

(0.020) 

Youngest child age 3-5 * female 0.026 

(0.025) 

0.036 

(0.033) 

Youngest child aged 6-10 0.013 

(0.016) 

0.008 

(0.019) 

Youngest child aged 6-10 * female

0.026 

(0.025) 

0.088*

(0.047) 

Youngest child aged 11-17 -0.009

(0.013) 

-0.009

(0.017) 

Youngest child aged 11-17 * female 0.047 

(0.030) 

0.055 

(0.040) 

F-statistic 13.47 79.80

Number of observations 10,732 4,515 

Notes: A third alternative in the model, not shown here, includes work in other locations on all diary days and work

exclusively at home on weekdays. All regressions include region, occupation, industry, weekend diary day, and year 

indicators as well as a constant. Marginal effects are evaluated at the mean. Sampling weights are used to account

for survey design. Standard errors are in parentheses. Significance levels: * =p<.10;**=p<.05;***=p<.01.

35
Table 8. Marginal Effects of Select Covariates on the Probability of Bringing Work Home from

Multinomial Logit Model Using the CPS Supplement, by Year (Comparison Group = No Work at Home)

2001 2004

Female 0.002 

(0.003) 

-0.012***

(0.003) 

Age 0.006***

(0.001) 

0.004***

(0.001) 

Age squared/1000 -0.061***

(0.011) 

-0.034***

(0.010) 

Black -0.026***

(0.004) 

-0.021***

(0.003) 

Other race -0.027***

(0.004) 

-0.014***

(0.004) 

Hispanic -0.026***

(0.004) 

-0.016***

(0.004) 

Married 0.011***

(0.004) 

0.004 

(0.003) 

Divorced 0.009*

(0.006) 

0.000 

(0.004) 

High school degree 

0.072***

(0.015) 

0.016*

(0.010) 

Some college

0.130***

(0.019) 

0.042***

(0.012) 

Bachelor's degree 0.317***

(0.033) 

0.099***

(0.019) 

Advanced degree 

0.485***

(0.042) 

0.181***

(0.032) 

Part time -0.027***

(0.004) 

-0.023***

(0.003) 

Youngest child 0-2 0.015** 

(0.007) 

0.021***

(0.007) 

Youngest child 0-2* female -0.021***

(0.007) 

-0.016***

(0.006) 

Youngest child aged 3-5 0.021***

(0.007) 

0.016***

(0.006) 

Youngest child age 3-5 * female -0.010

(0.007) 

-0.004

(0.007) 

Youngest child aged 6-10 0.012*

(0.007) 

0.006 

(0.005) 

Youngest child aged 6-10 * female -0.016**

(0.007) 

-0.010

(0.007) 

Youngest child aged 11-17 0.008 

(0.006) 

0.002 

(0.005) 

Youngest child aged 11-17 * female -0.005

(0.007) 

-0.000

(0.007) 

F-statistic 37.13 712.84

Number of observations 31,542 39,549

Notes: A third alternative, not shown here, includes work in other locations and paid work at home. All

regressions include region, occupation, industry, and year indicators as well as a constant. Marginal effects are 

evaluated at the mean. Sampling weights are used to account for survey design. Standard errors are in

parentheses. Significance levels: * =p<.10;**=p<.05;***=p<.01. 

36
37

Table 9. Daily Hours Worked for Nonfarm Business Employees (ATUS) 

Weekday Diaries 

Weekend/holiday 

Diaries 

Workplace 

Only 

Bring 

Work 

Home 

Workplace 

Only 

Bring 

Work 

Home 

2003 ATUS: daily hours 8.2 9.1 7.1 2.1 

 ATUS: daily workplace hours 8.2 7.4 7.1 0.6 

 ATUS: daily hours at home - 1.6 - 1.4 

2004 ATUS: daily hours 8.2 8.7 7.4 2.7 

 ATUS: daily workplace hours 8.2 7.3 7.4 0.8 

 ATUS: daily hours at home - 1.3 - 1.8 

2005 ATUS: daily hours 8.1 9.2 6.9 2.1 

 ATUS: daily workplace hours 8.1 7.5 6.9 0.6 

 ATUS: daily hours at home - 1.4 - 1.5 

Note: F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent level. 
38

Table 10. Average Weekly Hours Worked for Nonfarm Business Employees (ATUS) 

Weekday Diaries Weekend/holiday Diaries All Diaries 

Workplace 

Only

Bring Work

Home

Workplace 

Only

Bring Work

Home

Workplace 

Only

Bring Work

Home

2003 Average weekly hours 38.1 41.6 36.5 42.0 37.9 41.7

Number of observations 2,335 201 679 249 3,014 450 

2004 Average weekly hours 38.0 41.4 37.2 43.0 37.9 41.9

Number of observations 1,591 151 447 194 2,038 345 

2005 Average weekly hours 38.4 43.5 36.4 43.8 38.2 43.6

Number of observations 1,523 131 393 169 1,916 300 

Note: F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent level. 
Table 11. Average Weekly Hours Worked for Nonfarm Business Employees 

(CPS Supplement)

No Work 

at Home

Bring Work 

Home

Bring Work Home

at Least Once a week

Average weekly hours 36.9 44.6 - 1997

 Number of observations 32,305 2,733 - 

Average weekly hours 36.8 44.5 45.1 

2001

 Number of observations 30,124 2,908 2,040 

Average weekly hours 36.5 43.8 44.3 

2004

 Number of observations 34,892 3,160 2,269 

Note: F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent level. 

39
Table 12: Hours Worked for Production/Nonsupervisory Employees (ATUS)

Workplace 

Only 

Bring 

Work

Home

Bring 

Work

HomeSalaried 

 

Share of production/ nonsupervisory 

employees 86.2% 6.1% 4.0%

2003 Share of daily hours worked at home* - 20.0% 19.2% 

 Average weekly hours 37.0 38.3 39.3 

 (0.3) (1.2) (1.5) 

 Number of observations 2,413 264 174 

 

Share of production/ nonsupervisory 

employees 85.6% 7.8% 4.6%

2004 Share of daily hours worked at home* - 15.7% 17.0% 

 Average weekly hours 36.7 39.4 42.6 

 (0.4) (1.5) (1.8) 

 Number of observations 1,565 220 136 

 

Share of production/ nonsupervisory 

employees 85.6% 7.4% 4.5%

2005 Share of daily hours worked at home* - 17.9% 16.4% 

 Average weekly hours 37.1 42.2 42.9 

 (0.5) (1.1) (1.5) 

 Number of observations 1,497 182 128 

 Note: Standard errors are in parentheses. F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 

percent level.

* weekday value used

** results for weekdays and weekends available upon request from the authors 

40
Table 13. Hours Worked for Production/Nonsupervisory Employees 

(CPS Supplement)

 WORK AT HOME 

 

NO 

WORK 

AT 

HOME Paid 

Bring 

work 

home

Bring 

work 

home at 

least once a 

week

Share of production/ 

nonsupervisory employees 92.4% 2.5% 5.0% -

Average weekly hours 36.1 38.1 42.6 -

 (0.1) (0.7) (0.5) -

1997 

 

Number of observations 27,060 754 1,453 -

Share of production/ 

nonsupervisory employees 91.3% 2.9% 5.7% 4.0%

Average weekly hours 36.0 37.8 42.5 42.9 

 (0.1) (0.6) (0.4) (0.5)

2001 

 

Number of observations 25,057 802 1,570 1,118 

Share of production/ 

nonsupervisory employees 91.7% 2.8% 5.3% 3.9%

Average weekly hours 35.8 37.5 41.9 42.0 

 (0.1) (0.7) (0.4) (0.6) 

2004 

 

Number of observations 29,540 941 1,766 1,296 

 Note: Standard errors are in parentheses. F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent 

level.

41
Table 14: Hours Worked for Nonproduction/Supervisory Employees (ATUS)

Workplace 

Only 

Bring 

Work

Home

Bring 

Work

HomeSalaried 

Share of nonproduction/supervisors 73.1% 16.3% 13.8% 

Share of daily hours worked at home* - 13.6% 14.1% 

Average weekly hours 41.9 46.5 47.8 

 (0.5) (1.1) (1.2)

 

2003 

 

 

 Number of observations 601 186 162 

Share of nonproduction/supervisors 76.6% 12.2% 10.5% 

Share of daily hours worked at home* - 15.1% 15.9% 

Average weekly hours 42.1 47.0 47.4 

 (0.6) (1.2) (1.3)

2004 

 

 

 Number of observations 473 125 111 

Share of nonproduction/supervisors 72.0% 14.7% 12.7% 

Share of daily hours worked at home* - 15.9% 13.2% 

Average weekly hours 42.0 45.1 46.5 

 (0.7) (1.3) (1.4)

 

2005 

 

 

Number of observations 327 78 66 

Note: Standard errors are in parentheses. F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent 

level. 

* weekday value used

** results for weekdays and weekends available upon request from the authors 

42
Table 15: Hours Worked for Nonproduction/Supervisory Employees 

(CPS Supplement) 

 WORK AT HOME 

 

NO WORK

AT HOME Paid 

Bring 

work 

home

Bring work 

home at 

least once a 

week 

Share of nonproduction/ 

supervisory employees 74.4% 6.6% 18.8% -

Average weekly hours 40.6 40.2 46.8 - 

 (0.2) (0.9) (0.4) -

1997 

 

Number of observations 5,245 452 1,280 - 

Share of nonproduction/ 

supervisory employees 72.8% 7.1% 19.7% 13.7% 

Average weekly hours 40.6 39.9 46.6 47.5 

 (0.2) (0.7) (0.4) (0.5)

2001 

 

Number of observations 5,067 505 1,338 922 

Share of nonproduction/ 

supervisory employees 72.9% 7.2% 19.6% 13.9% 

Average weekly hours 40.8 39.7 46.1 47.0 

 (0.2) (0.8) (0.4) (0.5)

2004 

 

Number of observations 5,352 556 1,394 973 

Note: Standard errors are in parentheses. F-test results for differences in means are all significant at the 5 percent level.

43
Table 16: Percent of Unmeasured Hours for Employees in the Nonfarm Business Sector 

(No Recall Bias) 

Production/nonsupervisory employees 

Those who do not bring 

work home Those who do bring work home 

 

Share of 

production/

nonsupervisory

employees 

AWHP

Percent 

of hours

at home 

Share of 

production/

nonsupervisory

employees 

AWHP

Percent of 

unmeasured 

hours 

2003 96.0% 37.0 19.2% 4.0% 39.3 0.82%

ATUS 2004 95.5% 36.7 17.0% 4.6% 42.6 0.90%

2005 95.5% 37.1 16.4% 4.5% 42.9 0.85%

1997 95.0% 36.1 18.5% 5.0% 42.6 1.09%

2001 94.3% 36.0 13.3% 5.7% 42.5 0.89% CPS 

Supplement 

2004 94.7% 35.8 14.6% 5.3% 41.9 0.91%

2001 96.0% 36.0 15.7% 4.0% 42.9 0.75%

CPS 

Supplement 

(at least once a

week) 2004 96.1% 35.8 17.1% 3.9% 42.0 0.78%

44
 Table 17: Percent of Unmeasured Employee Hours in the Nonfarm Business Sector 

Assuming Recall Bias, by Employee Status (ATUS) 

 

Share who 

bring work 

home

Percent of 

hours at home

AWH of those 

who bring work 

home

AWH those 

who do not 

bring work 

home

Percent of 

unmeasured 

hours 

Production/nonsupervisory employees 

2003 4.0% 0.19 39.3 37.0 0.81%

2004 4.6% 0.17 42.6 36.7 0.89%

2005 4.5% 0.16 42.9 37.1 0.84%

Nonproduction/supervisory employees 

2003 13.8% 0.14 47.8 41.9 2.22%

2004 10.5% 0.16 47.4 42.1 1.87%

2005 12.7% 0.13 46.5 42.0 1.85%

All employees 

Production/Nonsupervisory 

Employees 

Production/Nonsupervisory 

 Employees 

Share of 

total hours 

worked 

Percent of 

unmeasured 

hours 

Share of total 

hours worked 

Percent of 

unmeasured 

hours 

Percent of total 

unmeasured 

hours 

2003 0.78 0.82% 0.22 2.22% 1.13%

2004 0.78 0.90% 0.22 1.87% 1.11%

2005 0.79 0.85% 0.21 1.85% 1.06%

45
Table 18: Annual Average Growth in Hours of all Persons in the Nonfarm Business Sector 

No Recall Bias Recall Bias

 

OPT series

Adjusted Series Difference Adjusted Series Difference

2003-2004 1.36% 1.43% -0.07% 1.34% 0.02%

2004-2005 ATUS 1.65% 1.60% 0.05% 1.60% 0.04%

2003-2005 1.50% 1.52% -0.01% 1.47% 0.03%

1997-2001 0.80% 0.76% 0.04%

2001-2004 -0.62% -0.61% -0.01% CPS 

SUPPLEMENT 

1997-2004 0.19% 0.17% 0.02%

CPS 

Supplement 

(at least once a 

week)

2001-2004 -0.62% -0.61% -0.01%

46