The Determinants of Time Use By Women and Men in the Performance of Housework, Paid Work and Leisure Activities in a Brazilian City

The paper discusses the use of a regression model designed by Heckman to study the determination of paid work by women and men, also to ascertain the determination of time used to perform housework, and other time use variables, when there are wide differences in the frequencies of these activities reported by women and men. The methodology literature discusses well the regression models to be used in order to handle the wide number of zeros that occur when respondents do not report a given activity on the research dates that the time use diary is answered, but may well have performed that unreported activity on another date. The paper is concerned with another source of zeros, socially determined, as the differential enacting of housework, paid work and leisure presented by women and men in their daily lives. It is argued that the zero activities reported are not likely to be performed on another date, as they depend on gender attributions. The paper uses the Heckman double hurdle model in which the probability of performance of an activity is calculated along with the factors that determine the amount of time used in each activity, by women and men, in each variable examined. The paper uses as a source of information, a probability survey in the city of Belo Horizonte,  Minas Gerais, Brazil, in 2001, with 1124 diaries  answered for the days of the week and 1133 diaries for the days of the weekend..