Arbeitspapier

Preferences over Relative Income within the Household

What preferences do partners hold over their relative income within the household? We provide a flexible framework of preferences over relative income within the household that captures various motives, including inequality aversion and a preference for being the primary earner. We study the role of these preferences for marital selection, separation and household public good provision in a marriage market matching model with search frictions. We test the model predictions using large administrative tax data from Germany. We document the existence of a kink point in the relative income distribution at the point of spousal income equality, consistent with the presence of kinked preferences over relative income. We also find the presence of a convex kink in wives' household public good provision, suggesting that women bear the incidence of spousal relative income preferences. To disentangle the preferences of women and men, we implement a survey experiment. Our results indicate that women exhibit inequality aversion while men exhibit a preference for being the primary earner.

Sprache
Englisch

Erschienen in
Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 16803

Klassifikation
Wirtschaft
Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making‡
Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure; Domestic Abuse
Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
Thema
relative income concerns
relative income distribution

Ereignis
Geistige Schöpfung
(wer)
Hermle, Johannes
Herold, Elena
Hildebrand, Nikolaus
Ereignis
Veröffentlichung
(wer)
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
(wo)
Bonn
(wann)
2024

Letzte Aktualisierung
10.03.2025, 11:43 MEZ

Datenpartner

Dieses Objekt wird bereitgestellt von:
ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. Bei Fragen zum Objekt wenden Sie sich bitte an den Datenpartner.

Objekttyp

  • Arbeitspapier

Beteiligte

  • Hermle, Johannes
  • Herold, Elena
  • Hildebrand, Nikolaus
  • Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Entstanden

  • 2024

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