Work doesn’t seem to limit socializing. My favorite result was that the better-educated people seem to fear visiting relatives:
Over time, increases in hours of work per capita have created the
intuitively plausible notion that there is less time available to
pursue social interactions. The specific question addressed in this
paper is the effect of hours of work on social interaction. This is a
difficult empirical question since omitted factors could increase both
hours of work and social interaction. The approach taken in this paper
utilizes an exogenous decline in hours of work in France due to a new
employment law. The results clearly show that the employment law
reduced hours of work but there is no evidence that the extra hours
went to increased social interactions. Although hours of work are not
an important determinant of social interaction, human capital is found
to be important. The effect of human capital, as measured by education
and age, is positive for membership groups but negative for visiting
relatives and friends. Also, contrary to expectations, there are no
important differences in the determinants of social interaction by
gender, marital status or parent status. Finally, a comparison between
France and the US show that the response to human capital and other
variables are much the same in both nations.
Here is the paper, I don’t yet see a non-gated version on-line.
I love your post, thank you for the info I dont think the interaction does involve longer hours. A human is a human anywhere in the world.
Now I can explain to my parents why I don’t visit much!! Its my damn education mom, sorry, nothing personal. I can’t wait to try that one out
Wow… “The approach taken in this paper utilizes an exogenous decline in hours of work in France due to a new employment law.” …And we wonder why people don’t understand economics.
Isn’t this from the abstract, the section that should summarize?
I guess it’s not too relevant to their results, but isn’t the definition of human capital as a function of education and age sligthly odd?
For example, if you look at the statement that human capital had a positive effect on group membership looks very different if you know it really means age, and higher age just means you have had more opportunities to join groups. Also, my understanding is that in the wider social capital literature the concept relates to social networks.
Anyway, personally working less would (and has) influenced my time spent on social interactions.
“My favorite result was that the better-educated people seem to fear visiting relatives”
My guess would be that education and what it entails (traveling abroad for work/phd-related reasons, for instance) ends up, to some extent, making you more different from your relatives and childhood friends than what your counterfactual-self with less years of education would have been. If this guess is correct (i only have anecdotical evdience) it is not exactly education per se but other factors associated with it (job and regional mobility, career involvement, wider horizons, different experiences…) what causes you to visit your relatives less often.
Other potential explanations:
- formal education raises everybody’s expectations regarding your “life performance” but in practice education seems to be way more helpful in getting you a nice job than in getting you a “nice” non-professional life. You go back home and despite the PhD and all that they look at you funny because you are still the same good old mess.
- formal education also raises your own expectations in general as well as your critical thinking capacity. This has many good side effects but I would not bet it is a 100% effective recipe for being happy and avoiding becoming sort of emotionally dissociated.
The presence or absence of halfway-decent food plays a big role in my social-interactions life.
Olivia -
I have a fear of visiting with a certain part of my family, the less educated poor side. I like spending time with the richer less educated side, almost as much as the richer more educated side. Its less stimulating to interact with the less educated poor side, and they also decrease my confidence levels because they remind me of where I come from and how much I have to overcome to become successful. Whereas, the richer side is more able to entertain me, regardless of if we have anything in common. Also, the richer sides are a confidence boost because the less educated side shows me that I do not have to become the smartest person in the world to make money, and the more educated side shows me I may have some genetic ability to become successful.
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