Trends and determinants of spousal gap in commuting time

Black, Kolesnikova, and Taylor (2014) show evidence using 1980-2000 US census data that labor force participation rates of married women are negatively correlated with the metropolitan area commuting time. Rosenthal and Strange (2012) argue that female entrepreneurs may face higher commuting costs because of greater domestic burden. Using the 2000 US census they show that the male-female commuting difference is roughly 20% for self-employed women. This married women’s shorter commuting contributes to the fact that female-owned enterprises are located in less agglomerated areas.

We use Korean population census 2% sample data for years 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005 and 2010 to analyze trends and determinants of spousal gap in commuting time and distance for Korean working couples.

We first analyze whether there are any trends in convergence in spousal gap in commuting time and distance for Korean working couples over the two decades of 1990-2010. We analyze the changes in spousal gap in commuting time and distance by the size of region, husband’s and wife’s educational level, husband’s and wife’s occupation, husband’s and wife’s income level, age group, number of children, presence of the couple’s parents in the household, and by transportation mode.

We also perform the regressions on commuting time or distance using all the above variables as independent variables. We will especially pay attention to the influences of the husband's education, age, occupation, income, and commuting time and distance on his wife’s commuting time and distance.

Crane (2007) shows evidence using  the American Housing Survey data of 1985-2005 that contrary to some new report arguing that the gender gap in commuting time and distance may have quietly vanished in some areas, his results show that the difference in men’s and women’s commuting time and distance stubbornly endures, with men’s and women’s commuting distances converging only slowly and commuting times diverging.

It will be interesting to see how Korean trends on the difference in men’s and women’s commuting time and distance are different from those of the U.S. obtained by Crane (2007). We will also be interested in assessing how much Korean husbands’ changes in their attitude towards participating in home production activities are contributing factors if our results reveal that there is significant convergence in spousal commuting time and distance in Korea.