Presentation (CTI)

OBJECTIVES: To quantify how informal caregiving status and intensity reshape individuals’ 24-hour time allocation in the United States, and to examine whether time-use trade-offs differ between weekdays and weekends.
METHODS: Using pooled 2018-2023 American Time Use Survey (ATUS) data (N = 38,937), this study examines how time is reallocated across market work, non-market work, personal care, sleep, leisure, and other activities as caregiving intensity increases. Fractional multinomial logit (FMLM) models estimate associations between caregiving (status and hours per day) and activity time shares, adjusting for a comprehensive set of demographic, socioeconomic, and household covariates.
RESULTS: Active caregiving is associated with significant reductions in market work (average treatment effect on the treated [ATT]: −46.8 minutes/day), leisure (−24.5 minutes), and sleep (−24.7 minutes). These reallocations emerge even at low caregiving intensities (<0.5 hours/day) and increase progressively with additional caregiving time. Trade-off patterns differ by day type: on weekdays, caregiving primarily displaces market work (ATT: −72.0 minutes), whereas on weekends it mainly replaces leisure (−36.1 minutes) and sleep (−37.9 minutes).
CONCLUSIONS: Informal caregiving substantially reshapes daily time allocation beyond paid labor, with clear intensity gradients and pronounced weekday-weekend contrasts. These findings provide the first contemporary U.S. benchmark of intensity-dependent caregiving time trade-offs, offering an empirical foundation for policy analysis and economic evaluations that explicitly value caregivers’ time.