Time Poverty of the Working Generation

Abstract

Many conventional studies of poverty have incorporated economic indicators, such as income, as criteria to ascertain whether certain conditions constitute poverty. However, both time and money are finite resources in life. Particularly working generation people must obtain a certain amount of both to maintain a decent living standard. Some minimum time must be spent for sleeping, leisure, and housework, including childcare, to reproduce labor power beyond the present generation. Estimations of time poverty emphasizing the working generation have been conducted actively in Western countries in recent years. Even in Japan, several studies have been conducted. This paper presents a review of time poverty studies in economically developed countries taking into consideration, percentages of households lacking minimum time for housework, and the policy implications for poverty reduction in working generations.Comparative analysis of conventional income-based poverty estimations and time-based poverty estimations reveals that conventional methods underestimate levels of poverty in households with two full-time workers and households with preschool children. Consideration of the time dimension is expected to produce more appropriate policy approaches to poverty reduction.