Time use, mobility and expenditure: an innovative survey design for understanding individuals’ trade-off processes

Abstract

A large amount of information is required to model the complex trade-off processes between travel activities, non-travel activities and budget assignment at the individual level. This paper describes the development of a new survey design, which incorporates components of travel surveys, time use surveys and consumer expenditure surveys in an integrated format, which is expected to deliver a richer data set allowing deeper insights into individuals’ activity and consumption patterns. The survey procedure and the incentives paid, which were necessary to obtain acceptable response rates, are also described. Results from two pilot studies using a trip-based and an activity-based diary format are presented. The paper examines to which extent the diaries have been capable of collecting the required data with high quality and response rates. The innovative “Mobility–Activity–Expenditure-Diary” is introduced and results of the main survey using this design are presented. Travel behaviour and non-travel activities were reported at high quality. Expenditures would require longer observation periods (and preferably not only telephone but also personal support in the survey process) to reduce unsystematic variations and to better capture individuals’ long term equilibrium.

The role of unpaid domestic work in explaining the gender gap in the (monetary) value of leisure

“…Hössinger et al (2019) present a detailed review of plausibility checks, imputations, and error corrections done to the data. Aschauer et al (2018Aschauer et al ( , 2019 give a comprehensive overview of MAED characteristics.…”

A joint time-assignment and expenditure-allocation model: value of leisure and value of time assigned to travel for specific population segments

“…A relevant new aspect of the paper at hand is the estimation of time-use models from a dataset in which activities and expenditures are obtained simultaneously from the same individuals in a diary-based survey. The underlying dataset is discussed in detail in papers by Aschauer et al (2018Aschauer et al ( , 2019. The sample provides information about all activities, expenditures, and travel decisions over a period of 1 week.…”

“…Only employed persons were selected for participation because a wage rate is required for model estimation. The survey procedure followed the household travel survey tradition with some modifications resulting from the necessity of screening for employed persons and the high Aschauer et al (2018Aschauer et al ( , 2019, where the MAED data are presented and compared to the latest Austrian travel survey, time-use survey, and expenditure survey.…”

“…This requires a procedure of combining both sources in a manner that avoids doublecounting through expenses that occur in both sections. Aschauer et al (2019) describe the procedures that have been tested and applied in this context. The collection of expenditure data at two levels (personal and household) induces the need of some rule to allocate the expenses to those individuals who generate income (i.e.…”

“…The classification of committed expenses (E C ) follows Aschauer et al (2019) as well as Mokhtarian and Chen (2004): expenses on goods associated with physical needs or maintenance were classified as 'committed'. People need to eat (food), take care of their health (personal), and need a dwelling (housing) with equipment (furnishing).…”