Individual Wealth and Time Use : Evidence from Cambodia
A better understanding of how individual wealth and time use are linked—across paid, unpaid, and leisure activities —is important for targeting widespread gender inequalities in time allocation, as well as in accessing economic opportunities. The lack of reliable, individual-level data on asset...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2021
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/undefined/726271630415504648/Individual-Wealth-and-Time-Use-Evidence-from-Cambodia http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36230 |
| Summary: | A better understanding of how individual wealth and time
use are linked—across paid, unpaid, and leisure activities
—is important for targeting widespread gender inequalities
in time allocation, as well as in accessing economic opportunities.
The lack of reliable, individual-level data on asset
ownership across different subpopulations, however, has
limited discussions of these issues in the literature. Using
a unique nationally representative survey from Cambodia,
this paper shows that individual wealth, as measured
through self-reported ownership of physical and financial
assets, is significantly associated with time allocation to
different activities. The role of asset ownership in time use
is also stronger, particularly among women, vis-à-vis the
competing proxies for socioeconomic status. Ownership of
financial accounts, motorized vehicles, and mobile phones
—all of which can improve access to networks, markets, and
services—is associated with less time in unpaid work, and
in some cases greater time in paid work, specifically among
women in off-farm jobs. There are also distinct gender differences
in how men and women shift their time away from
leisure and childcare, highlighting the importance of social
norms in choices over time use. The analysis highlights the
utility of integrated, intra-household, individual-disaggregated
data collection on asset ownership, time use, and
employment in lower-income contexts. |
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