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Consumption and Children

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Author Info
Martin Browning (Department of Economics, University of Oxford, and CAM)
Mette Ejrnæs (Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen, and CAM)

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Abstract

Consumption by couples rises sharply in the beginning and falls later in life; the causes of the early rise are hotly contested. Among the suggestions are rule of thumb behavior, demographics, liquidity constraints, the precautionary motive, and nonseparabilities between consumption and labor supply. We develop two tests of the extreme hypothesis that only changes in family structure matter. We estimate effects of the numbers and ages of children on consumption. These estimates allow us to rationalize all of the increase in consumption without recourse to any of the causal mechanisms. Our estimates can be interpreted either as giving upper bounds on the effects of children or as evidence that the other causes are not important. Copyright by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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File URL: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1162/rest.91.1.93
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Publisher Info
Article provided by MIT Press in its journal The Review of Economics and Statistics.

Volume (Year): 91 (2009)
Issue (Month): 1 (09)
Pages: 93-111
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Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:91:y:2009:i:1:p:93-111

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  1. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Dirk Krueger, 2002. "Consumption over the Life Cycle: Facts from Consumer Expenditure Survey Data," NBER Working Papers 9382, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Martin Browning & Thomas F. Crossley, 2001. "The lifecycle model of consumption and saving," IFS Working Papers W01/15, Institute for Fiscal Studies. [Downloadable!]
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  3. Frank Caliendo & Kevin X.D. Huang, 2007. "Overconfidence and Consumption over the Life Cycle," Working Papers 0712, Department of Economics, Vanderbilt University. [Downloadable!]
  4. Mauro Mastrogiacomo & Nicole Voskuilen-Bosch, 2006. "Income incentives to labour participation and home production; the contribution of the tax credits in the Netherlands," CPB Discussion Papers 59, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis. [Downloadable!]
  5. Felix Freyland, 2005. "Household Composition and Savings: An Overview," MEA discussion paper series 05087, Mannheim Research Institute for the Economics of Aging (MEA), University of Mannheim. [Downloadable!]
  6. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Dirk Krueger, 2002. "Consumption over the Life Cycle: Some Facts from Consumer Expenditure Survey Data," Centro de Alti­simos Estudios Ri­os Pe©rez(CAERP) 7, Centro de Altisimos Estudios Rios Perez (CAERP). [Downloadable!]
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  7. James Feigenbaum & Geng Li, 2008. "Lifecycle Dynamics of Income Uncertainty and Consumption," Working Papers 360, University of Pittsburgh, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2008. [Downloadable!]
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  8. Fang Yang, 2009. "Consumption over the Life Cycle: How Different is Housing?," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(3), pages 423-443, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Orazio Attanasio & Hamish Low, 2002. "Estimating Euler equations," IFS Working Papers W02/06, Institute for Fiscal Studies. [Downloadable!]
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  10. Frank Caliendo & Kevin X. D. Huang, 2007. "Overconfidence in financial markets and consumption over the life cycle," Working Papers 07-3, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. [Downloadable!]
  11. Freyland, Felix, 2004. "Household Composition and Savings: An Overview," Sonderforschungsbereich 504 Publications 04-69, Sonderforschungsbereich 504, Universität Mannheim & Sonderforschungsbereich 504, University of Mannheim. [Downloadable!]
  12. Bruce Bradbury, 2004. "The Price, Cost, Consumption and Value of Children," Labor and Demography 0402003, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
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  13. Felix Freyland, 2005. "Household Composition and Savings: An Overview," MEA discussion paper series 05087, Mannheim Research Institute for the Economics of Aging (MEA), University of Mannheim. [Downloadable!]
  14. Thomas F. Crossley & Krishna Pendakur, 2002. "Consumption Inequality," Department of Economics Working Papers 2002-09, McMaster University. [Downloadable!]
  15. Patricia Apps & Ray Rees, 2004. "Life Cycle Time Allocation and Saving in an Imperfect Capital Market," CEPR Discussion Papers 475, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University. [Downloadable!]
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