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How Do Married Wage Workers Use Their Time? :Latent Profile Analysis of Time Use

Background/Objectives: This study aims to characterize the time use patterns of married wage workers in Korea and to identify time-use imbalance between paid work and various areas of life. Grounded in the concept of time sovereignty, this study examines how a long-hours paid work–centered structure distorts the allocation of daily life time and provides an essential information for policies to restore work-life balance. Methods: Data were drawn from the 7th Korean Working Conditions Survey(KWCS, 2023), including 10,650 married wage workers. This analysis includes variables such as paid work hours per week, frequency of unexpected requests to return to work, flexibility of working hours, care and household work, exercise, leisure and cultural activities, and volunteer work. Latent profile analysis(LPA) was used to identify time use categories and compare differences in demographic characteristics, employment, and health status across categories. Results: The latent profile analysis identified four types of time use: (1)Paid Work–Centered, Unbalanced Group(72.0%), (2)Paid Work–Centered, Balanced Group(16.3%), (3)Flexible Paid Work Group(6.5%), and (4)Short-hours Paid Work, Domestic Work Group(5.3%). The majority of workers showed an imbalance in their use of time, with an emphasis on working hours. The ‘Flexible Paid Work Group’ showed the highest psychological well-being by they allocated their time relatively evenly between leisure and social activities. In contrast, the ‘Short-hours Paid Work, Domestic Work Group’ had lower subjective health and psychological well-being due to the high proportion of domestic work and limited leisure and social activities. Conclusion/Implications: The results of this study show that severe time use imbalance between paid work and various domains of life, along with the problem of long working hours in Korean society in general. This reduces leisure and social activities, and negatively affects quality of life and health. Furthermore, it is also predicted that there are groups who are more vulnerable in terms of time sovereignty. This is because they are in a socially and economically disadvantaged position. Future policies should aim not only at reducing paid work hours but also at restoring work-life balance in general. Customized support to mitigate imbalances among vulnerable groups, especially older and less educated women are pivotal.