Using data from the American Time Use Survey between 2003 and 2010, we document that home production absorbs roughly 30 percent of foregone market work hours at business cycle frequencies. Leisure absorbs roughly 50 percent of foregone market work hours, with sleeping and television watching accounting for most of this increase. We document significant increases in time spent on shopping, child care, education, and health. Job search absorbs between 2 and 6 percent of foregone market work hours. We discuss the implications of our results for business cycle models with home production and non-separable preferences.

Using time use survey data we document a hump-shaped profile of job search time in the United States across the life-cycle. The middle-aged unemployed spend roughly three times as much time in job search as the youngest group of unemployed. The hump-shaped profile of job search time is relatively stable across demographic groups. However, the profile of job search time appears to be declining in non-US countries. We discuss how standard life-cycle models with incomplete markets have difficulty in accounting for the hump-shaped profile found in the US data.