by Earlier this summer, four economists released a working paper suggesting that part of the decline in male labor-force participation can be attributed to the increased quality of video games. You can see an article about it here, and you can also see a non-technical summary of the paper as part of the NBER digest.Conceptually at least, this makes sense- better leisure activities increase the opportunity cost of working, which decreases the net benefit of working, and generally we do less of something when it’s perceived as less beneficial. As the article notes, this could lead to an increase in happiness for the non-working men (though perhaps not for those around them!) despite lower work hours/income if they like the video games more than they like what else they could get with the
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Jodi Beggs considers the following as important: Economics, labor force, labor force participation, labor supply, mario bros, nintendo, opportunity cost, video games
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Earlier this summer, four economists released a working paper suggesting that part of the decline in male labor-force participation can be attributed to the increased quality of video games. You can see an article about it here, and you can also see a non-technical summary of the paper as part of the NBER digest.
Conceptually at least, this makes sense- better leisure activities increase the opportunity cost of working, which decreases the net benefit of working, and generally we do less of something when it’s perceived as less beneficial. As the article notes, this could lead to an increase in happiness for the non-working men (though perhaps not for those around them!) despite lower work hours/income if they like the video games more than they like what else they could get with the income from working. (In other words, the video game choice, if it exists, isn’t necessarily irrational.)
Not surprisingly, some people have their doubts about this finding, and there is additional disagreement about the social and policy implications of such a conclusion. I think I fall into this camp to some degree, but the additional evidence in the link above makes it difficult for me to ignore the link between video games and male labor-force participation at a more general level.
I assume, like any good capitalist, he’s now living off of the interest on all those gold coins he’s collected.
You can also see the post on the original site here.