Reconciliation of work and family: the additional value of Time Use data Because of political importance of such matter, official statistics are also becoming increasingly interested in the work-family reconciliation theme. They have developed questions that allow fully grasping difficulties encountered in balancing work with family and that identify the instruments workers have adopted to deal with it and the results of such strategies. Nonetheless, it is not easy to measure the level to which individuals succeed in balancing work with non-work: because of the multi-dimensions of the concept of reconciliation, it is rather difficult to identify methodological instruments apt at providing a complete image of such phenomenon. In addition to surveying objective conditions, defined by the behaviours of the interviewees, they are also to render the perception interviewees have of it and their level of satisfaction. Although relations between subjective dimension and behaviours are often very complex and difficult to understand. The Time Use surveys are a good way of reaching such objective as they represent a precious source of information on the organization of daily life times and how they are divided among various activities. To balance different roles mainly means to balance different times: work time, family time and personal time. As interviewees are to fill in a diary on what they do during the day, where and with whom, the data gathered provide a wide set of important information that helps measure the balancing of the various times. Thus, Time Use surveys generally enable to examine and analyse the problems linked with the necessities of reconciling paid work, unpaid work and free time.1 1. First, Time Use surveys are considered as the most accurate source on time dedicated to work2. It is rather difficult for people to estimate the hours they actually dedicate to an activity (whether paid work, family work, the time spent in travelling, etc.) unless they are “obliged” to reconstruct all their actions during a day, as requested in the diaries. The traditional questions of the Labour Force surveys provide a less accurate estimate of hours worked, being more at risk of overestimation for some types of work and underestimation for other types. On the contrary, through the week diary, workers are required to accurately reconstruct their day and insert the time spent at work. Such aspect helps improve the answers’ quality, especially in the case of workers with non standard working hours. The accurate estimate of time devoted to work in order to study the work-life balance, especially the balancing of the working hours with the total remaining hours each person have for “discretional” use. Working hours strongly condition the life quality: higher is the time a person devotes to work during a day or a week, less time that person will have to enjoy the results of it. However, it is necessary to take into account a broader definition of hours worked in order to be able to consider its influence in the reconciliation of the needs. For example, Time Use surveys allow estimating the time used for travelling from and to work as well as the time that, though not paid, is spent in activities that help maintain for oneself and for one’s household a certain life standard. The concept of a “balanced life” indeed have to take into account also these dimensions, which are usually left out in traditional estimates on working time. To fully understand difficulties in balancing different times and its possible solutions, it is necessary to measure not only paid work time but also time spent in unpaid work and non binding time, in other words, free time and personal time. 2. Time Use surveys not only provide an estimate of hours of work, but also help contextualise this activity in a wider 24-hour framework, indicating start and end times.
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Eurostat (2000), Guidelines on Harmonised European Time Use Surveys, Luxembourg. Many studies have showed that estimate of the paid work hours deriving from Time Use surveys is more accurate and reliable th an estimates deriving from questions held in the Labour Force surveys; i.e. see Gershuny, J.I. and J.P. Robinson (1994), Measuring hours of paid work: time-diary vs. estimate questions, Bulletin of Labour Statistics, XI-XVII.
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This allows to survey precisely the number of work events, or single work intervals, as well as their duration and position in the time slots. The fact of having to manage shifts into and out of work is time-consuming and tiring as it leaves out less time for the rest: this aspect is crucial for highlighting how some work aspects can hamper the balancing of work and family. By surveying each event, it is possible to study their sequences, how they are inserted in the 24-hour day and how they interact with other life times. Thus, to reconstruct the exact sequence of working times with non working times means to be able to identify types of days/workers and different levels of work-family reconciliation. 3. In most countries that carry out Time Use surveys, household is the survey unit, and all members are requested to fill in the diaries. This enables to conduct intra-family analyses on life times and to study relations in time use of several persons. Moreover, it provides an additional value to analysis carried out on each person, especially as regards the work-family reconciliation. Possibility of adopting one strategy (part time job, flexible work hours, etc.) over another (a housekeeper or a baby sitter) and probability that it really helps balance better life times mainly derive from a complex organization of family life, that is, an articulated time use combination of cohabiting persons. Paths for a successful reconciliation cannot only concern one individual: they indeed reflect the entire net of relations, of which the person is part. Thus, the possibility of having a balanced life depends on how “times of the relations” are structured. 4. The fact that diaries survey not only main activities but also activities carried out simultaneously with the first ones, allows studying overlaps of different times. In particular, some jobs require to work at home or when travelling, or yet to purchase materials during one’s own free time and/or family time. They may also require some activities to be carried out outside the workplace or work hours, such as phoning, using the PC or Internet, reading, meetings, purchases, etc. Therefore, these diaries also help estimate the measure to which the work time “exceeds” its limits to invade and condition the non-work times. 5. To study reconciliation between family and work also means to analyse subjective aspects of this experience, that is, how interviewees see their free time and how satisfied they are. Thus, the data from the diaries provide an objective indication on how the time is used during the day. However, many countries have also inserted in Time Use surveys specific questions that measure the level of satisfaction of interviewees. These questions refer to the time devoted to different life aspects, to feelings of stress, to how they view the quality of their own life in general and in relation to particular fields. The relations between one’s feelings and one’s behaviours are rather complex since they involve many qualitative dimensions of the daily life that can hardly be gathered through a statistical survey. To possess certain goods, to have access to particular services or “opportunities”, or to have more free time does not automatically mean to have a “balanced” life. Likewise, a work that is very demanding in terms of work hours can either be seen as arduous or, on the contrary, as very gratifying and thus as being able to help reconcile 3. Despite the complexity of the relation between behaviours and life, the combination of these two data represents a further important value added that the Time Use surveys can offer for studying work-family reconciliation. A set of questions on reconciliation of family and work: the Italian Time Use experience
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Different studies have pointed out to the importance of the work context, such as relations with colleag ues and bosses and, more generally, with the whole work environment, in order for workers to be able to balance work and family; i.e., see Peter Berg, Arne L. Kalleberg, Eillen Appelbaum, Balancing Work and Family: The Role of High - Commitment Environments, in Industrial Relations, vol.42, n.2, April.
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The importance of Time Use surveys for analysing the reconciliation between family and work is even more evident in relation to the survey carried out in Italy in 2002-2003. Law 53 "Discipline for maternity and paternity support, for the right to care and education and for the coordination of the city times" establishes that it must be carried out every five year. Article 16 indeed states that: “The National Institute of Statistics (Istat) is to ensure, every five year, an informative flow on the population’s organization of life times by means of Time Use surveys, desegregating the information by gender and age”. In the 2002-2003 edition, Department for Equal Opportunities requested to survey reconciliation of work and family by means of a set of questions developed ad hoc and inserted in the individual questionnaire. To this purpose, it signed a convention with Istat. Such request stemmed from the awareness, even within the political context, that Time Use Survey provides “high-level quality information necessary for studying reconciliation of work and family”, that it guarantees its comparability at an european level and that it ensures “high-level quality as regards domestic and care work, and its entwining with the articulation of working times”. The questions of such model deal with the following topics: Full-time or part-time job Type of part-time work hours Reasons for having chosen a part-time job Reasons for not wanting or for not being able to work full time Availability of full-time workers to work part-time To work in shifts To work in the evening To work at nights To work on Saturdays To work on Sundays Main need whereby work hours are organised Main family whereby work hours are organised Interest in working at home Reasons for working or for wanting to work at home Use of ordinary maternity/paternity leave Number of days of ordinary maternity/paternity leave Main remuneration during statutory maternity/paternity leave Use of daily paid work leaves (breastfeeding leaves) following the birth of a child Use of parental leave Number of days taken for paternal leave Main remuneration during paternal leave Reasons for not having benefited of parental leave Use during the past 12 months of a leave to care for a sick child Number of days of work leave taken to care for a sick child during the past 12 months Other questions on family-work reconciliation In addition to the previously illustrated questions, object of the Convention, Italian questionnaires on Time Use (2002-2003) also help acquire many other interesting data that allow studying the balancing of the work times with family times. For example, questions held in the section “Family, work and free time” addressed to employed people examine the habit of spending one’s own work time with other family members, or of working outside one’s own work hours, such as during the
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holidays, the frequency with which this happens and the reasons for it. In particular, the questions cover: Habit of spending a part of or the whole work time with some family member Kinship with cohabiting family members with whom one regularly spends a part of or the whole work time Habit of working outside one’s own work hours Frequency of working outside one’s own work hours (at home, in the free time, etc.) Frequency of working during the holidays (weekends, holidays, etc) Reasons for working outside one’s own work hours Frequency of work activities carried out outside one’s work hours. These questions complete the framework acquired through the diaries, as they indicate frequency of overlaps between different times and reasons for working outside one’s usual workplace or work hours. Especially as regards female population, the problem of reconciliation does not involve only persons who resulted employed during the interview, that is persons who, playing the double role of mother and worker, have to deal with the problem of reconciliation. It also involves persons who have had to leave their job or who are no longer available to work because of their family needs. Such situations are even more critical; rather than having some difficulties, women are unable to reconcile work and family and must make some renunciations. In Italy, the Time Use survey questionnaire pays particular attention to the non-employed people. It indeed aims at analysing main reasons for non-participating in the labour market, whether that being the consequence of having stopped a work activity or for not being available to start a job, despite still being in an active age. Despite the numerous reasons behind such behaviours, questions are formulated in such a way as to highlight the role of the family condition in determining incompatibilities between work and family of persons who have renounced for the moment being or who are unable to carry out any extra-domestic work. The following list of questions are addressed to the non-employed people: Past job Reasons for not having worked in the past Reasons for having ended a job activity Feelings linked with having ended a job activity Experience of a lay off or forced resignation during or following a pregnancy Job search actions Reasons for not searching a job Finally, questions at the bottom of the Italian day reveal how interviewees perceive their time, and whether they are satisfied with the time devoted to the various life fields. The picture that emerges from the analysis on objective indicators must indeed be completed with the information relative to the experience of people and to how they perceive, whether satisfying or not, the time they spent. By asking interviewees to express their degree of satisfaction in relation to the quantity of time they dedicate to various life aspects and to some specific aspects of their daily life (health, economic conditions, work, life their couple, friendship, quantity and quality of free time, etc), it could be possible to examine more in-depth an important aspect of reconciliation: the life quality perceived. The questions briefly described in this paragraph are presented as closed questions to pre-codified answers. Therefore, they could also be used in other surveys, though the real value added of time use surveys is the increasing informative power that comes from the availability of information on life times of each social groups. In conclusion, the data gathered through the diaries, in which people are asked to indicate, as detailed as possible, contents of their daily life, activities carried out, where and with whom, play an important role in the debate of reconciliation of work and family.
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Not only do they estimate the total volume of work more accurately than other survey instruments, but they also provide some other very important information, such as the exact sequence of work times during the day, the relation with times of all the other daily activities and with times of other persons. Though it does provide some interesting data for analysing reconciliation, the ad hoc form added in the 2005 Labour Force survey suffers from the often inaccurate estimate of the worked time and from the impossibility of understanding the results in the light of concrete organization of daily life, of relations with the daily life of other family members, and the results in terms of quality perceived. For example, to estimate the number of part-time workers and the reasons for working part time is not sufficient. Rather, it is necessary to understand how the work-free time is spent, in what activities and especially if it has improved the life quality perceived and has led to a balanced life. It is possible to carry out analyses that take into account all these aspects only thanks to data from Time Use survey diaries. References Eurostat (2000), Guidelines on Harmonised European Time Use Surveys, Luxembourg. Eurostat (2005), Reconciliation of work and private life: a comparative review of thirty European countries, Luxembourg. Fisher, Kimberly, and Layte, Richard (2002). “Measuring Work-Life Balance and Degrees of Sociability: A Focus on the Value of Time Use Data in the Assessment of Quality of Life”, EPAG Working Paper 2002-32. Colchester: University of Essex. Fisher, K. e R. Layte (2004), “Measuring work-life balance using time diary data”. eIJTUR, vol.1, n.1: 1-13. Gershuny, J.I. and J.P.Robinson (1994), Measuring hours of paid work: time-diary vs. estimate questions, Bulletin of Labour Statistics, XI-XVII Istat (2006), Tempo di lavoro e vita quotidiana, in Rapporto Annuale 2005, Roma: 160167. Lehto, Anna-Maija (1999). “Time pressure as a stress factor. competitiveness and gendering changes in working conditions”. Paper presented at the II International congress women, work and health. Rio de Janeiro, 19-22 September. Robinson, J., R.D. Putnam, e G. Godbey (1997). Time for life: the surprising ways americans use their time. Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press. Romano, M.C. (2004), “The conciliation between family and work: strategies of italian women”. Paper presented at the XXVI Conferenza internazionale Iatur “Time use: what’s new in methodology and application fields”, Rome, 27-29 October. Romano, M.C.. T.Cappadozzi (2006), “Household work and gender division in Italy: main changes over time”. Paper presented at the XXVIII Iatur Conference “Time Use Research - an Interdisciplinary Issue”, Copenhagen, 16-18 August.
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