The impact of home production on economic inequality in Germany
Abstract
Using representative income and time-use data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we estimate non-monetary income advantages arising from home production and analyze their impact on economic inequality. As an alternative to existing measures, we propose a predicted wage approach that relaxes some of the strong assumptions underlying both the standard opportunity cost approach and the housekeeper wage approach. We also propose a method of adjusting the number of hours spent on home production to reduce the bias arising from multi-tasking and joint production in time-use data. Sensitivity analyses comparing results among different approaches provide indications of method effects. Although this study supports the evidence that considering home production leads to a reduction in inequality, we show that the size of this effect differs according to the variations in the mean and distribution of the estimated monetary value of home production across the three approaches. This finding underscores the need for a harmonized approach in cross-national comparative research. Copyright Springer-Verlag 2012Download Info
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Bibliographic Info
Article provided by Springer in its journal Empirical Economics.
Volume (Year): 43 (2012)
Issue (Month): 3 (December)
Pages: 1143-1169
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Related research
Keywords: Home production; Non-cash incomes; Economic inequality; SOEP; Time use; D31; D13; I32;Other versions of this item:
- Joachim R. Frick & Markus M. Grabka & Olaf Groh-Samberg, 2009. "The Impact of Home Production on Economic Inequality in Germany," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 159, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
- Frick, Joachim R. & Grabka, Markus M. & Groh-Samberg, Olaf, 2009. "The Impact of Home Production on Economic Inequality in Germany," IZA Discussion Papers 4023, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
- D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
- D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation
- I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
References
References listed on IDEASPlease report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Duncan Ironmonger, 1996. "Counting outputs, capital inputs and caring labor: Estimating gross household product," Feminist Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 2(3), pages 37-64.
- Smeeding, Timothy M & Weinberg, Daniel H, 2001. "Toward a Uniform Definition of Household Income," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 47(1), pages 1-24, March.
- Sutherland, Holly & DeCoster, Andre & Matsaganis, Manos & Tsakloglou, Panos, 2009. "Accurate income measurement for the assessment of public policies: final report," EUROMOD Working Papers EM7/09, EUROMOD at the Institute for Social and Economic Research.
- Peter Gottschalk & Susan E. Mayer, 1997. "Changes in Home Production and Trends in Economic Inequality," Boston College Working Papers in Economics 382, Boston College Department of Economics.
- Gronau, Reuben, 1980. "Home Production-A Forgotten Industry," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 62(3), pages 408-16, August.
Citations
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.Cited by:
- Luca Marchiori & Olivier Pierrard, 2012. "LOLA 2.0: Luxembourg OverLapping generation model for policy Analysis," BCL working papers 76, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
- Joachim Frick & Kristina Krell, 2011.
"Einkommensmessungen in Haushaltspanelstudien für Deutschland: Ein Vergleich von EU-SILC und SOEP,"
AStA Wirtschafts- und Sozialstatistisches Archiv,
Springer, vol. 5(3), pages 221-248, December.
- Joachim R. Frick & Kristina Krell, 2009. "Einkommensmessungen in Haushaltspanelstudien für Deutschland: ein Vergleich von EU-SILC und SOEP," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 237, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
- Joachim R. Frick & Kristina Krell, 2010. "Measuring Income in Household Panel Surveys for Germany: A Comparison of EU-SILC and SOEP," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 265, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
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