What about the differences between men and women?

Table A.1 shows that, on average, male workers spend nearly as much time as female workers with family members during the typical workday.  This lack of difference is confirmed, moreover, in several subgroups of the worker population.

In fact, aside from the difference between men and women based on the structure of their household (especially the presence of children, who had a greater influence on the time women spent with family), further analyses did not reveal differences between male and female workers based on age, area of residence or level of schooling.  For example, holding the other factors constant, men between age 30 and 34 spent neither more nor less time with family members than did women in the same age group.

The same thing is confirmed regarding the association between workday duration and time spent with family; holding all the factors included in Model 4 constant, and making comparisons based on sex, a woman who had worked 9 hours, for example, spent the same average amount of time with family as a man who had worked the same number of hours.

The only exception is women who had worked between 3 and 5 hours compared to men who had worked the same number of hours.  We know that it is in this subgroup that the estimated time spent with family members increases most (Model 4 estimates that this group of workers spent about 2 hours more with family than the group of workers whose workday ranged from 7 to 8 hours).  Further analysis comparing the workers according to gender revealed that women who had worked between 3 and 5 hours during the day spent an estimated 34 minutes less with family members than did their male counterparts (holding the other factors constant).  It is, however, difficult to explain why this is so.

In short, aside from the presence of children in the homes of workers living with a partner, the impact of virtually all variables that were shown to correlate with time spent with family was the same for both men and women.