According to the results of an annual government survey, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the proportion of Americans working from home has almost doubled in 2020.
According to the Associated Press, the US Time Use Survey also found that during the pandemic, the proportion of women who work remotely has increased more than men.
The survey found that overall, between 2019 and 2020, the number of people working from home in the United States increased from 22% to 42%. The proportion of men working remotely increased by 16%, while the proportion of women working from home increased by 23%.
Liana C. Sayer, director of the Maryland Time Utilization Laboratory at the University of Maryland, said the transition to remote working conditions may increase Americans’ desire to maintain more flexible work schedules.
“Employees said in surveys conducted by the company and other research groups that they prefer to be able to work from home and set the start time and end time according to the way they think best suits other needs,” Saiyer said. “Some people say they really don’t want to go back to their office life before the pandemic.”
For more reports from the Associated Press, please see below.
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This is one of the surprising findings of an annual government survey that documented the profound impact of the virus pandemic on the daily lives of Americans since the outbreak last March.
The US Time Use Survey details how people spend their time in 2020, from work to relaxation to sleep. All survey participants aged 15 years or older will interview by phone what they did in the 24 hours prior to the interview. (For 2020, the report only covers the period from May to December, after the virus caused the suspension of data collection earlier this year.)
Due to the pandemic and the extensive social distance required, compared with 2019, people spent more time sleeping, watching TV, playing games, using computers, and relaxing and thinking last year compared to 2019, while people spent more time socializing and communicating in person But even less. On average, they spend more time caring for the children at home.
The survey also supports concerns that the pandemic has worsened the isolation of millions of Americans. As people work from home or go to school online, their time alone increases. Among Americans 15 years of age and older, the average daily time spent alone increased by an hour. For people between 15 and 19 years old, add 1.7 hours a day.
Among workers 25 and older with at least a bachelor’s degree, 65% of employed workers reported working from home during the 2020 24-hour survey period—a 28 percentage point increase from 2019. In contrast, only 19% of employed workers will work from home in the same age group with the highest education level of high school diploma in 2020, up from 13% in 2019.
In sectors of the economy that involve face-to-face contact or professional business equipment (from leisure and hotels to transportation and utilities), the shift to remote work is rarer than in sectors that are not involved.
More time spent at home, work or other aspects means that Americans spend less time on the road. From 2019 to 2020, the average time for commuting and other trips will decrease by 26 minutes per day.
The Department of Labor’s annual survey is designed to measure how, where, and with whom Americans spend time. The latest results show that the time spent on childcare increased in 2020, reflecting the cancellation of face-to-face school teaching, sports and other activities for children. Compared with 2019, adults with youngest children between the ages of 6 and 12 spend 1.6 hours more time per day while taking care of their children while doing other things as their main activities.
At the same time, on a certain day in 2020, the number of adults with children providing childcare services has decreased. This may reflect the reduction in time spent on picking up children for face-to-face activities.
The data also shows that the gender gap in parenting has increased: Compared with 2019, women will spend 13 more minutes in the family directly caring for their children every day in 2020, while men will spend roughly the same amount of time in 2020 as in 2019.
In 2020, women will spend 46 minutes longer at home doing education-related activities for their children than men. In 2019, men and women spent roughly the same amount of time on these activities.
The Brookings Institution’s analysis of survey data found that mothers of children 12 years of age and under spend an average of more than 8 hours of childcare time at home. The Brookings Institution’s analysis also found that in 2020, working mothers will provide 7.4 hours of parenting time on working days, which is more time than working fathers, unemployed fathers and fathers who are not in the labor force.
“Parenting is now a mother’s full-time job,” said Lauren Bauer, an economic research fellow at the Brookings Institution. “They spend more than 8 hours a day taking care of their children, and their working hours are also affected. Even if they take care of their children’s responsibilities and work, their workload is now less than before.”
As many businesses are closed due to public health advice, the survey found that time spent in bars, restaurants, grocery stores, and shopping centers has decreased, while time spent at home has increased. Compared with 2019, people aged 15 and above spend more time with their families and less time with other people.
By 2020, the average daily time people spend on sports and leisure has increased by 32 minutes-partly due to the decline in employment and travel during the pandemic. They also watch more TV and sleep a few more minutes a day.
Daniel Hamermesh, an economist at Barnard College who studies time-use economics, said: “If people rest well, I don’t think it’s the worst thing in the world.” “I agree more. Leisure. So I don’t think it means any negative impact on the economy that we don’t know about.”
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