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A Matter of Weight? The Role of Spouses. Physical Attractiveness on Hours of Work

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  • Sonia Oreffice
  • Climent Quintana-Domeque

Abstract

We explore the role of relative physical attractiveness in the household on the hours worked by married men and women. Using PSID data, we find that husbands who are thinner relative to their wives work fewer hours, while wives who are heavier relative to their husbands work more hours. High relative body weight leads to low Pareto weight in the household, inducing spouses to compensate with more hours of work. These re- sults are robust to controlling for individual and spousal characteristics. Our household bargaining interpretation is supported by the fact that we cannot statistically reject the collective proportionality restriction when including measures of the distribution of relative physical attractiveness in the population.

Suggested Citation

  • Sonia Oreffice & Climent Quintana-Domeque, 2012. "A Matter of Weight? The Role of Spouses. Physical Attractiveness on Hours of Work," CHILD Working Papers Series 7, Centre for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics (CHILD) - CCA.
    • Handle: RePEc:cca:wchild:7
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    File URL: http://www.child.carloalberto.org/images/documenti/child07_2012.pdf
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    hours worked; body mass index; collective model.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

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