March 29, 2024

Economix: Mexicans Work the Longest Hours

According to a new report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, people in Mexico spend more hours of their day working than the people of any other country.

The average Mexican devotes 10 hours a day to paid and unpaid work, like cleaning, child care and cooking at home. Belgians, on the other hand, spend the least time each day working, about seven hours, among the 29 countries covered.

DESCRIPTIONSource: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Note: Traveling time related to paid and unpaid work is included in the respective categories.

That compares with an overall O.E.C.D. average of eight hours a day. In the United States, people spend about eight and a quarter hours a day doing paid and unpaid work — that is, 4 hours 49 minutes a day in paid work or in study, and 3 hours 26 minutes doing unpaid work. (The averages are for the entire population, 15 to 64 years old, whether employed outside the home or not.)

The main reason Mexicans spend so much time working is because they do so much unpaid work, more than four hours each day, the highest of all the countries evaluated by the O.E.C.D. Most of that work is housework, especially cooking.

Of this group of countries Americans spend the least time cooking each day (30 minutes) and Turks spend the most (74 minutes). Americans also spend relatively low amounts of time eating, a habit that correlates with higher obesity rates.

DESCRIPTIONSource: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

Today’s O.E.C.D. report has also estimated the value of a country’s unpaid work relative to the size of its overall economy. Across the O.E.C.D., unpaid work represents about one-third of gross domestic product; that share is lowest in South Korea, at 19 percent, and highest in Portugal, at 53 percent.

As noted in an earlier blog post, in every developed country, women spend more time doing unpaid work than men do.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=11b83ae55d2094b67b37c397cde6d109

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