Konstantinos Tatsiramos

We examine how rising temperatures affect the quantity and quality of time spent with colleagues, an important input to coordination and productivity. Linking U.S. county-day temperature variation to time-use diaries, we find that hot days reduce interactions during peak working hours, with no offset later in the day, and that these reductions are especially pronounced for meaningful interactions. These effects arise from shifts in when and where work occurs and are concentrated among workers in flexible occupations. Taken together, these findings reveal a trade-off: flexibility mitigates heat exposure but reduces face-to-face interactions, with implications for labor markets and organizational design.

We propose a twin family model linking twins with their spouses and children to quantify the relative importance of genetic and environmental factors in explaining the variance of socio-economic outcomes. Using data from the Danish Twins Registry and population registers, we test and relax the assumptions of the standard behavioral genetics model most frequently applied in economics using twins or adoptees. Exploiting an education reform differentially affecting parents, we find no evidence of gene-environment interactions. While we find some assortative mating based on genetic factors, differentially shared environments are key: they explain half of the variance in years of schooling, whereas genetic factors explain only nine percent. We find similar percentages for earnings, income, and wealth. Decomposing intergenerational elasticities reveals that shared environments explain 50% for earnings, 60% for income, 70% for wealth, and 80% for schooling. Family environments are more important than previously understood.

We leverage U.S. county-day temperature variation combined with daily time use data to examine the effect of temperature on the timing of work. We find that warmer (colder) temperatures increase (decrease) working time during the night and decrease (increase) working time in the morning. These effects are pronounced among workers with increased bargaining power, flexible work schedules, greater exposure to ambient temperature while at work, and fewer family-related constraints. Workers compensate for the shifts in the timing of work triggered by temperature fluctuations by adjusting their sleep time, without changing the timing of leisure and home production activities.

We combine exogenous variation in temperature at the county-day level in the U.S. with daily time use data to examine the effect of temperature on joint time use. We show that low temperatures reduce time spent with friends but increase time spent with family. Conversely, high temperatures increase time alone but reduce time with family. We also provide evidence of the effect of temperature on joint time use being location-dependent. We rationalize this finding using a model in which the chosen time allocation is the outcome of a dual-self decision process with an indoor and an outdoor self. The two selves have different tastes for time alone, time with family, and time with friends. Weather conditions can change the influence of each self, and thereby the corresponding preferences for joint time use. We test the predictions of the model empirically by drawing on methods from the household economics literature. The test results support the hypothesis that weather affects joint time use insofar it affects where the activities take place.

We combine exogenous variation in temperature at the county-day level in the U.S. with daily time use data to examine the effect of temperature on joint time use. We show that low temperatures reduce time spent with friends but increase time spent with family. Conversely, high temperatures increase time alone but reduce time with family. We also provide evidence of the effect of temperature on joint time use being location-dependent. We rationalize this finding using a model in which the chosen time allocation is the outcome of a dual-self decision process with an indoor and an outdoor self. The two selves have different tastes for time alone, time with family, and time with friends. Weather conditions can change the influence of each self, and thereby the corresponding preferences for joint time use. We test the predictions of the model empirically by drawing on methods from the household economics literature. The test results support the hypothesis that weather affects joint time use insofar it affects where the activities take place.

We study the effect of childbirth on local and non-local employment dynamics for both men and women using Belgian social security and geo-location data. Applying an event-study design that accounts for treatment effect heterogeneity, we show that 75 percent of the effect of the birth of a first child on the overall gender gap in employment is accounted for by gender disparities in non-local employment, with mothers being more likely to give up non-local employment compared to fathers. This gender specialisation is mostly driven by opposing job location responses of men and women to individual, household and regional factors. On the one hand, men do not give up non-local employment after childbirth when they are employed in a high-paid job, have a partner who is not participating in the labour market or experience adverse local labour market conditions, suggesting that fathers trade off better employment opportunities with longer commutes. On the other hand, women give up non-local jobs regardless of their earnings level, their partner’s labour market status and local economic conditions, which is consistent with mothers specialising in childcare provision compared to fathers.

We develop a multiple-events model and exploit within and between country variation in the timing, type and level of intensity of various non-pharmaceutical interventions to study their dynamic effects on the daily incidence of COVID-19 and on population mobility patterns across 135 countries. Taking into account the contemporaneous presence of multiple interventions, we remove concurrent policy bias from the effect of each policy of interest, and we establish that policies curb the epidemic by changing population mobility patterns in a manner consistent with time-use and epidemiologically relevant considerations. We are thus able to shed light on the mechanisms through which confinement measures contribute to "flattening the curve".

We develop a multiple-events model and exploit within and between country variation in the timing, type and level of intensity of various non-pharmaceutical interventions to study their dynamic effects on the daily incidence of COVID-19 and on population mobility patterns across 135 countries. Taking into account the contemporaneous presence of multiple interventions, we remove concurrent policy bias from the effect of each policy of interest, and we establish that policies curb the epidemic by changing population mobility patterns in a manner consistent with time-use and epidemiologically relevant considerations. We are thus able to shed light on the mechanisms through which confinement measures contribute to "flattening the curve".

Job protection reduces job turnover by changing firms' hiring and firing decisions. Yet the effect of job protection on workers' quit decisions and post-quit outcomes is still unknown. We present the first evidence using individual panel data from 12 European countries, which differ both in worker turnover rates and in the level of job protection. We find that workers are less likely to quit their job in countries with more job protection, but conditional on quitting they receive higher wages. This evidence can be explained by increased mobility costs associated with higher expected risk of post-quit layoff and job mismatch.

We investigate the effect of social interactions on labor market outcomes using a direct measure of social contacts based on information about individuals’ three best friends and their characteristics. We examine the effect of the number of employed friends on the transition from non-employment to employment, and we find the existence of significant network effects at the individual level. An additional employed friend increases the probability of finding a job by 3.7 percentage points. This finding is robust to specifications that address the endogeneity of friends’ employment status, which may be induced by correlation with unobserved individual attributes and feedback effects. Considering labor market outcomes, we find evidence of higher wages and employment stability for those with more employed friends, which is consistent with networks acting as an information transmission mechanism.