Spouses’ earnings association and inequality: A non-linear perspective

We analyze the association between spouses’ earnings taking account of non-linearities along both spouses’ distribution of earnings. We also document the non-linearity of the relationships between earnings and labor force participation, earnings and couple formation, and earnings and number of children. Using simulations, we then analyze how changes in spouses’ rank-dependence structure, labor force participation and couple formation contribute to the upsurge in inequality in the U.S between 1967 and 2018. We find that an increased tendency towards positive sorting contributed substantially to the rise in inequality only among dual-earner couples, while it contributed little to overall inequality across households. Temporal and distributional heterogeneity are important, as earnings association had a more substantial role in the bottom of the earnings distribution and in recent years. The decline in couple formation contributed substantially to the rise in inequality, while the increase in female labor force participation and the fertility decline had equalizing effects.

     

Children, spousal love, and happiness: an economic analysis

In this paper we examine how children affect happiness and relationships within a family by analyzing two unique questions in the National Longitudinal Study of Youth’s 1997 cohort. We find that (a) presence of children is associated with a loss of spousal love; (b) loss of spousal love is associated with loss of overall happiness; but (c) presence of children is not associated with significant loss of overall happiness. If children reduce feelings of being loved by the spouse but do not reduce reported happiness even though spousal love induces happiness, then it must be the case that children contribute to parental happiness by providing other benefits. After ruling out some competing compensation mechanisms we infer that loss of spousal love is compensated with altruistic feelings towards children.     

The economics of gay and lesbian couples: Introduction to a special issue on gay and lesbian households

This article presents a simple conceptual framework integrating three couple-related outcomes analyzed in this volume: wage differentials in earnings related to couple formation, household formation (including cohabitation and registration as Registered Domestic Partnership), and intra-household allocation of income. It also discusses some of the articles’ main findings.

Women's Labor Supply,Marriage, and Welfare Dependency

Abstract. This paper provides a rational choice model that simultaneously analyses women's decisions about welfare dependency, labor supply, and marriage. The model is based on the Demand and Supply (D&S) models of marriage inspired by Becker's theory of marriage. In addition to reproducing old insights about income effects and marriage market effects on welfare dependency, the model offers new insights regarding the effects on welfare dependency of sex ratios, divorce laws, cohort size, and traditional expectations about marriage and family. The model helps understand why welfare is more common among black women in the USA and offers a new interpretation for past trends in American women's welfare dependency: the big increase in welfare dependency in the late 1960s is interpreted as a baby‐boom phenomenon and recent reductions in welfare dependency are partially seen as the expression of young women's better marriage market opportunities.     

Cohort-level sex ratio effects on women’s labor force participation

It follows from a number of theoretical models of marriage that the scarcer women are relative to men, i.e., the higher the sex ratio, the less married women are likely to participate in the labor force. Such sex ratio effects may be stronger among less educated women. These predictions are tested using individual data from Current Population Surveys for four regions of the U.S. (Northeast, Midwest, South and West), and for the U.S. as a whole, covering the period 1965–2005 at 5-year intervals. Within-region sex ratio variation results from variation in cohort size (due principally to large fluctuations in number of births) and limited fluctuations in the difference between male and female age at marriage. As hypothesized, we find that sex ratios are inversely related to women’s labor force participation, reflecting that ceteris paribus women born in years of peak baby-boom are more likely to be in the labor force than women born in years of peak baby-bust. Additionally, weaker sex ratio effects are found among educated women in two of the four regions of the United States.

Common Law Marriage and Teen Births

Whether common law marriage (CLM) in the US affects teen birth rates is the central question we address. CLM effects were identified through cross-state and time variation, as four states repealed the law over the period of study. Using microdata from Current Population Survey Fertility supplements 1990–2010 and state-level data from CDC Vital Statistics 1988–2012 we found that, in the states where CLM was first available but then repealed, the odds that teens would become new mothers increased. Births to teens younger than 18 were more responsive to availability of CLM than those to teens aged 18 or 19 or to women in their early twenties. The likelihood of becoming a mother increased where CLM was available in the years prior to its repeal. Teens were more responsive to information about availability of CLM about three years later than to knowing that it is available at the time of potential conception. To the extent that they reduce teen births CLM laws are socially desirable and states that still have CLM may be better off by not repealing the law.     

Are COVID fatalities in the US higher than in the EU,and if so,why?

Review of Economics of the Household - The COVID crisis has severely hit both the United States and Europe. We construct comparable measures of the death toll of the COVID crisis suffered by US...