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Social Change: The Sexual Revolution

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  • Jeremy Greenwood
  • Nezih Guner

Abstract

In 1900 only 6% of unwed teenage females engaged in premarital sex. Now, three quarters do. The sexual revolution is studied here using an equilibrium matching model, where the costs of premarital sex fall over time due to technological improvement in contraceptives. Individuals differ in their desire for sex. Given this, people tend to circulate in social groups where prospective partners share their views on premarital sex. To the extent that society's customs and mores reflect the aggregation of decentralized decision making by its members, shifts in the economic environment may induce changes in what is perceived as culture.

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File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/j.1468-2354.2010.00605.x
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Bibliographic Info

Article provided by Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association in its journal International Economic Review.

Volume (Year): 51 (2010)
Issue (Month): 4 (November)
Pages: 893-923

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Handle: RePEc:ier:iecrev:v:51:y:2010:i:4:p:893-923

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Citations

Blog mentions

As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
  1. Sex, norms & technology
    by chris dillow in Stumbling and Mumbling on 2010-11-03 12:48:06
  2. Marxism & the mainstream
    by chris dillow in Stumbling and Mumbling on 2009-07-10 13:26:02
  3. Marx was right
    by chris dillow in Stumbling and Mumbling on 2012-03-20 14:15:21
  4. Why so much teenage sex?
    by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2009-06-24 09:33:00
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
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Cited by:
  1. Nico Voigtländer & Joachim Voth, 2008. "How the West "invented" fertility restriction," Economics Working Papers 1264, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Dec 2012.
  2. Fabio Mariani, 2012. "The economic value of virtue," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 323-356, December.
  3. Georgi Kocharkov, 2012. "Abortions and Inequality," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2012-22, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.
  4. Alessandra Fogli & Laura Veldkamp, 2011. "Nature or Nurture? Learning and the Geography of Female Labor Force Participation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(4), pages 1103-1138, 07.
  5. Luis Cabral, 2007. "Lock in and Switch: Asymmetric Information and New Product Diffusion," Working Papers 07-11, New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, Department of Economics.
  6. Jeremy Greenwood, 2011. "EconomicDynamics Interviews Jeremy Greenwood on DGE beyond Macroeconomics," EconomicDynamics Newsletter, Review of Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(2), April.

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