Working and Living: The Effects of Family Responsibilities and Characteristics on Married Women's Work Hours in the USA*

INTRODUCTIONLong working hours for Americans have been debated among scholars for more than a decade. Americans are feeling overworked due to increased work hours (Schor, 1991) or hours which are longer than they prefer (Reynolds, 2003). Although some studies find tittle change in overall average work hours among U.S. workers from 1940 to the late 1980s, those with college or more education experienced an increase in work hours (Coleman and Pencavel 1993a, 1993b). Leete and Schor (1994) also find an increase in annual market hours of more than 200 hours for women but a decrease for men between 1969 and 1989.Importantly, a significant work hour increase between 1950 and 2000 is observed among married women. During the time period, weekly work hours have more than doubled among married women, and have more than quadrupled among married women with preschool-age children (McGrattan and Rogerson, 2004). Although the majority of married women are in the labor force, their work hours have not been fully examined. Existing literature focuses more on unmarried women's work hours. Since factors associated with married women's work hours have not been fully explored, this study intends to identify these factors by examining white, African American and Hispanic women separately.The purpose of this study is to examine married women's work hours with regard to relationships to these women's family responsibilities and spousal characteristics. There are two questions we intend to explore. The first question is "how do family responsibilities affect married women's work hours for different racial/ethnic groups?" We limit our study focus to married women since married women's family responsibilities and family characteristics should greatly vary from those of unmarried women. We also make racial and ethnic group comparisons among African American, Hispanic, and white women. Existing literature shows that African American women's work hours are less influenced by their family responsibiUties and characteristics than white women's work hours. However, an intersection of marriage and race has not been fully explored.Although race/ethnicity is an important factor to consider, several studies do not include it when examining women's work hours (Gerstel, et al., 2007; Grant, et al., 1990; Leete and Schor, 1994; Maume and Bellas, 2001). This is a significant shortcoming since minority women's labor market experiences differ from the experiences of white women (Bell, 1998; Bell and Nkomo, 200 1 ). Even when race is included, studies on women's labor force participation and work hours with a focus on race tend to look at single mothers (Cohen, 2002; Figueroa and Melendez, 1993) or unmarried women (Rexroat, 1990). Some studies have examined women's work hours by race, and found significant differences between African American and white women. However, in such studies, marital status is often entered as a dummy variable in an analysis (Kahn and Whittington, 1996; Model, et al., 1992), assuming an equal influence of famuy responsibiUties and characteristics on women's work hours between married and unmarried women. Importantly, Landry and Jendrek ( 1 978) point out that comparing African American women and white women in general includes two different economic groups. Since the marriage rate is significantly higher for white women than for African American women (Bramlett and Mosher, 2002), it is necessary to separate married and non-married women in work hour analyses. Moreover, this study includes married Hispanic women to compare tiieir work hours with white and African American women. This study intends to deepen our understanding of married African American, Hispanic, and white women's work hours.The second question posed is "do family characteristics affect African American, Hispanic, and white women differently?" In order to address the question, this study includes spousal income, work hours, and occupation. Feldman (2002) states that women who are breadwinners in the family work longer hours than women who are not breadwinners. …