Daniel Hamermesh
Daniel Hamermesh appears in Why the U.S. Has No Guaranteed Paid Vacation as the labor economist who tests and narrows common explanations for the U.S. paid-vacation gap. He rejects a simple Protestant work-ethic story by pointing to countries with Protestant traditions that still guarantee weeks of vacation.
Hamermesh’s most important contribution is timing. The episode says U.S. workers had similar annual hours to other rich countries around 1979, after which other countries reduced working time while the United States did not. That makes the gap harder to explain as ancient national character, and pushes the source toward Employer-Bargained Benefits and political choice.
155.美貌能当饭吃吗?想赚钱该做点啥?拮据时应避免什么行为?经济学思维有什么用？ adds Hamermesh from a different labor-economics angle. The episode cites his beauty-and-income research to anchor Beauty Economics / 美貌经济学 and Attractiveness Labor-Market Premium / 外貌劳动力市场溢价, using appearance effects as a case where economic description should not be blocked by moral discomfort.
Connections
- Planet Money and NPR - source and network context.
- Paid Vacation As Labor Right - central policy question he evaluates.
- Labor Moral Ambivalence - cultural explanation he treats as incomplete.
- Tom Cohen - institutional account Hamermesh treats as stronger than the alternatives.
- Beauty Economics / 美貌经济学 and Attractiveness Labor-Market Premium / 外貌劳动力市场溢价 - appearance-and-income branch added by episode 155.