All Work and No Play? A Comment on Prasch’s “Reassessing the Labor Supply Curve”
In a recent paper in this journal, Robert E. Prasch (2000) offered a timely commentary on the problematical status of the standard labor supply curve. His key argument was that the marginal utility of leisure time is negative at low levels of income. For low-income workers, leisure time will prove a source of deep malaise and this will compel them to prolong their hours of paid work even though the returns from working time may be low. In this case, contra orthodox theory, poorer workers will not seek more leisure time as wages fall. Indeed, by working longer hours, Prasch argued, these workers can achieve the income they require to "enjoy leisure." This focus on high income as the solution to the problem ofleisure is challenged below. The following comment is divided into two sections. The first deals with the relationship between income and leisure. Higher income, it is argued, need not raise the utility of leisure time if workers are affected adversely through working longer work hours. The second section re-examines the distinction between work and leisure. The important point is not whether workers like or dislike leisure time but that their collective freedom under capitalism is limited to non-work time. In a negative sense, therefore, leisure time represents the subordinate position of workers vis-a-vis work. In this light, it is insufficient to focus merely on low income; the status ofleisure itself needs to be confronted especially as it "opposes" work.