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(Cynthia Negrey is an Associate Professor Sociology Department, University of Louisville) This paper is an argument for a new, shorter, full-time work norm in the United
States. It examines the context of “time famine” as a product of women’s increased labor
force participation and an increase in household total employment hours, a caregiving
gap, bifurcation of aggregate work hours, and a gap between workers’ actual and ideal
work hours. Inadequacies of current alternative work-time arrangements and the Family
and Medical Leave Act are addressed and some international comparisons are discussed.
Following Appelbaum et al. (2002), the author argues for a “shared work/valued care”
model of work-time allocation.