Alesina is italian, as I am, and over here some of us think that he has become more american than americans. Anybody who has real experience with workers in Europe and USA knows quite well that what they appear to claim is not true. I would strongly advise most of these people who write these things to take some vacation, have some leisure for the benefit of us all.
Massimo Portolani
On 13/mag/05, at 18:53, michael perelman wrote:
"Work and Leisure in the U.S. and Europe: Why so Different?"
BY: ALBERTO F. ALESINA Harvard University Department of Economics Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) EDWARD L. GLAESER Harvard University Department of Economics National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Brookings Institution BRUCE SACERDOTE Dartmouth College Department of Economics National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Document: Available from the SSRN Electronic Paper Collection: http://papers.ssrn.com/paper.taf?abstract_id=706982
Paper ID: Harvard Institute of Economic Research Discussion Paper No. 2068 Date: April 2005
Contact: EDWARD L. GLAESER Email: Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Postal: Harvard University Department of Economics Room 315A Littauer Center Cambridge, MA 02138 UNITED STATES Phone: 617-495-0575 Fax: 617-495-8570 Co-Auth: ALBERTO F. ALESINA Email: Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Postal: Harvard University Department of Economics Littauer Center Cambridge, MA 02138 UNITED STATES Co-Auth: BRUCE SACERDOTE Email: Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Postal: Dartmouth College Department of Economics 6106 Rockefeller Hall Hanover, NH 03755 UNITED STATES
ABSTRACT: Americans average 25.1 working hours per person in working age per week, but the Germans average 18.6 hours. The average American works 46.2 weeks per year, while the French average 40 weeks per year. Why do western Europeans work so much less than Americans? Recent work argues that these differences result from higher European tax rates, but the vast empirical labor supply literature suggests that tax rates can explain only a small amount of the differences in hours between the U.S. and Europe. Another popular view is that these differences are explained by long-standing European "culture", but Europeans worked more than Americans as late as the 1960s. In this paper, we argue that European labor market regulations, advocated by unions in declining European industries who argued "work less, work all" explain the bulk of the difference between the U.S. and Europe. These policies do not seem to have increased employment, but they may have had a more society-wide influence on leisure patterns because of a social multiplier where the returns to leisure increase as more people are taking longer vacations.
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Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University michael at ecst.csuchico.edu Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
