Americans worked more than Europeans because of health insurance forms, not values
Expanding government health benefits to unemployed Americans did more to reduce working hours than any labor reform designed to reduce working hours.
What happened
Americans used to work significantly more hours than people in other developed countries. That gap has now closed by about half. This change happened because the U.S. government started offering more health benefits to people who are not employed.
Why it matters
For decades, the U.S. economy was built on the idea that people worked more hours than in other countries. This paper shows that the U.S. is now catching up to the rest of the world in terms of work hours. The reason is not that people are working less hard, but that the government is providing more support for people not working. This could change how we think about work incentives and social safety nets.
The signal
If further ACA analysis or a public option debate resurfaces, this paper becomes the empirical anchor for the argument that universal coverage reduces labor supply — and every legislator who has called Americans lazy for working less since 2000 will have to decide whether they knew about the health insurance mechanism.
The paper set out to explain why Americans work less now. It found out Americans used to work more because they had no choice. The paper calls this a finding.