IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/eurpop/v36y2020i4d10.1007_s10680-019-09547-8.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Gender Cliff in the Relative Contribution to the Household Income: Insights from Modelling Marriage Markets in 27 European Countries

Author

Listed:
  • André Grow

    (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research)

  • Jan Van Bavel

    (University of Leuven (KU Leuven))

Abstract

In Western countries, the distribution of relative incomes within marriages tends to be skewed in a remarkable way. Husbands usually do not only earn more than their female partners, but there is also a striking discontinuity in their relative contributions to the household income at the 50/50 point: many wives contribute just a bit less than or as much as their husbands, but few contribute more. This ‘cliff’ has been interpreted as evidence that men and women avoid situations where a wife would earn more than her husband, since this would go against traditional gender norms. In this paper, we use a simulation approach to model marriage markets and demonstrate that a cliff in the relative income distribution can also emerge without such avoidance. We feed our simulations with income data from 27 European countries. Results show that a cliff can emerge from inequalities in men’s and women’s average incomes, even if they do not attach special meaning to a situation in which a wife earns more than her husband.

Suggested Citation

  • André Grow & Jan Van Bavel, 2020. "The Gender Cliff in the Relative Contribution to the Household Income: Insights from Modelling Marriage Markets in 27 European Countries," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(4), pages 711-733, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:eurpop:v:36:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s10680-019-09547-8
    DOI: 10.1007/s10680-019-09547-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10680-019-09547-8
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10680-019-09547-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Karin Hederos & Anders Stenberg, 2022. "Gender identity and relative income within households: evidence from Sweden," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(3), pages 744-772, July.
    2. Frances Goldscheider & Eva Bernhardt & Trude Lappegård, 2015. "The Gender Revolution: A Framework for Understanding Changing Family and Demographic Behavior," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 41(2), pages 207-239, June.
    3. Keeley, Michael C, 1977. "The Economics of Family Formation," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 15(2), pages 238-250, April.
    4. André Grow & Christine Schnor & Jan Van Bavel, 2017. "The reversal of the gender gap in education and relative divorce risks: A matter of alternatives in partner choice?," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 71(0), pages 15-34, October.
    5. Maximilian Sprengholz & Anna Wieber & Elke Holst, 2019. "Gender Identity and Wives' Labor Market Outcomes in West and East Germany between 1984 and 2016," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1799, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    6. Peter Todd & Francesco Billari & Jorge Simão, 2005. "Aggregate age-at-marriage patterns from individual mate-search heuristics," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 42(3), pages 559-574, August.
    7. Marianne Bertrand & Emir Kamenica & Jessica Pan, 2015. "Gender Identity and Relative Income within Households," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(2), pages 571-614.
    8. Anja Roth & Michaela Slotwinski, 2018. "Gender Norms and Income Misreporting within Households," CESifo Working Paper Series 7298, CESifo.
    9. Claudia Goldin, 2014. "A Grand Gender Convergence: Its Last Chapter," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(4), pages 1091-1119, April.
    10. Steven Ruggles, 2015. "Patriarchy, Power, and Pay: The Transformation of American Families, 1800–2015," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 52(6), pages 1797-1823, December.
    11. Gunter J. Hitsch & Ali Hortaçsu & Dan Ariely, 2010. "Matching and Sorting in Online Dating," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 130-163, March.
    12. André Grow & Jan Van Bavel, 2015. "Assortative Mating and the Reversal of Gender Inequality in Education in Europe: An Agent-Based Model," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(6), pages 1-24, June.
    13. Peter Todd & Thomas Hills & Andrew Hendrickson, 2013. "Modeling reproductive decisions with simple heuristics," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 29(24), pages 641-662.
    14. Nicole Hiekel & Aart Liefbroer & Anne-Rigt Poortman, 2014. "Understanding Diversity in the Meaning of Cohabitation Across Europe," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 30(4), pages 391-410, November.
    15. Amitrajeet Batabyal, 2009. "The optimal reservation utility in models of decision making in arranged marriages," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(17), pages 1695-1698.
    16. Natalia Zinovyeva & Maryna Tverdostup, 2021. "Gender Identity, Coworking Spouses, and Relative Income within Households," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 258-284, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Han Dongcheng & Kong Fanbo & Wang Zixun, 2021. "Gender identity and relative income within household: Evidence from China," Papers 2110.08723, arXiv.org.
    2. Alina CIUREA (MECA), 2022. "Impact of European Union Social Policy during Pandemic on Household Income," Economics and Applied Informatics, "Dunarea de Jos" University of Galati, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, issue 3, pages 117-124.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Daniel Kuehnle & Michael Oberfichtner & Kerstin Ostermann, 2021. "Revisiting gender identity and relative income within households: A cautionary tale on the potential pitfalls of density estimators," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(7), pages 1065-1073, November.
    2. Maéva Doumbia & Marion Goussé, 2021. "Gender identity and relative income within households: Evidence from Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(4), pages 1667-1683, November.
    3. Estefanía Galván, 2022. "Gender Identity and Quality of Employment," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 89(354), pages 409-436, April.
    4. Estefanía Galván & Cecilia García-Peñalosa, 2021. "Interactions amongst gender norms: Evidence from US couples," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 21-15, Instituto de Economía - IECON.
    5. Maximilian Sprengholz & Anna Wieber & Elke Holst, 2019. "Gender Identity and Wives’ Labor Market Outcomes in West and East Germany between 1984 and 2016," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 1030, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    6. Anja Roth & Michaela Slotwinski, 2018. "Gender Norms and Income Misreporting within Households," CESifo Working Paper Series 7298, CESifo.
    7. Karin Hederos & Anders Stenberg, 2022. "Gender identity and relative income within households: evidence from Sweden," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(3), pages 744-772, July.
    8. Pierre-André Chiappori & Carlo Fiorio & Alfred Galichon & Stefano Verzillo, 2022. "Assortative Matching on Income," Working Papers 2022-006, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    9. Francine D. Blau & Lawrence M. Kahn & Matthew Comey & Amanda Eng & Pamela Meyerhofer & Alexander Willén, 2020. "Culture and gender allocation of tasks: source country characteristics and the division of non-market work among US immigrants," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 907-958, December.
    10. Rodríguez-González, Ana, 2021. "The Impact of the Female Advantage in Education on the Marriage Market," Working Papers 2021:5, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    11. Jessen, Jonas, 2022. "Culture, children and couple gender inequality," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    12. Karen Codazzi & Valéria Pero & André Sant'Anna, 2017. "Gender identity and female labour supply in Brazil," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2017-105, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    13. Cavapozzi, Danilo & Francesconi, Marco & Nicoletti, Cheti, 2021. "The impact of gender role norms on mothers’ labor supply," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 186(C), pages 113-134.
    14. Gigi Foster & Leslie S. Stratton, 2021. "Does female breadwinning make partnerships less healthy or less stable?," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 34(1), pages 63-96, January.
    15. Ong, David & Yang, Yu (Alan) & Zhang, Junsen, 2020. "Hard to get: The scarcity of women and the competition for high-income men in urban China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    16. Shi, Xinjie & Huangfu, Bingyu & Jin, Songqing & Gao, Xuwen, 2023. "Property Rights, Labor Reallocation, and Gender Inequality in Rural China," 2023 Annual Meeting, July 23-25, Washington D.C. 335534, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    17. Han Dongcheng & Kong Fanbo & Wang Zixun, 2021. "Gender identity and relative income within household: Evidence from China," Papers 2110.08723, arXiv.org.
    18. Popov, Alexander, 2022. "The division of spoils in a booming industry," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 198(C), pages 341-369.
    19. Andrea Salazar-Díaz, 2022. "Ingreso relativo, identidad de género y brecha en el trabajo doméstico no remunerado: Evidencia para Colombia," Borradores de Economia 1191, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    20. Cassar, Alessandra & Zhang, Y. Jane, 2022. "The competitive woman: Evolutionary insights and cross-cultural evidence into finding the Femina Economica," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 447-471.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:eurpop:v:36:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s10680-019-09547-8. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.