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Modelling the Employment and Wage Outcomes of Spouses: Is She Outearning Him?

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Author Info
Bloemen, Hans () (Free University of Amsterdam)
Stancanelli, Elena () (CNRS, Nice)

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Abstract

This paper is focused on couple households where the wife is the main earner. The economic literature on this subject is particularly scant. According to our estimates, the wife was the main earner in one of every six couple households in France in 2002, including wife-sole-earner households. The proportion of wives outearning their husbands was 18% for dual-earners. About 24% of American women in dual-earner households earned more than their husband in 2004. Using a model of household labour supply behaviour, we show that households where the wife is the main earner may come about either because the husband has a weaker preference for work than his wife, due possibly to her high wage, or because he is hit by adverse circumstances, such as, for example, a decline in the demand for men with his particular qualifications. Positive assortative mating may also come into play. Our empirical model specifies spouse labour-market participation equations within each household, endogenizing wages and allowing for random effects and correlations in spouses’ unobservables. We conclude that the determinants of wife-sole-earner households are quite distinct from those for dual-earner households where she outearns him. The probability of observing the first seems to be more related to labour market difficulties of the husband, while the latter is not. Dual-earners where she outearns him are more likely to be found among higher educated couples, and especially, among couple where the wife’s education level is high.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 3455.

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Length: 36 pages
Date of creation: Apr 2008
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Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3455

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Related research
Keywords: marriage; work behaviour; household economics;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure

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References listed on IDEAS
Please 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.:
  1. Elena Stancanelli, 2007. "Evaluating the impact of the French tax credit on the employment rate of women," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2007-33, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Apps, P.F. & Rees, R., 1996. "Collective Labor Supply and Household Production," Papers 301, Australian National University - Department of Economics.
    Other versions:
  3. Patricia Apps, 2006. "Family Taxation: An Unfair and Inefficient System," CEPR Discussion Papers 524, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University. [Downloadable!]
  4. Apps, P.F. & Rees, R., 1993. "Labor Supply, Household Production and Intra-Family Welfare Distribution," Papers 248, Australian National University - Department of Economics.
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  5. Patricia Apps & Ray Rees, 2005. "Gender, Time Use, and Public Policy over the Life Cycle," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(3), pages 439-461, Autumn.
    Other versions:
  6. Drago, Robert & Black, David & Wooden, Mark, 2004. "Female Breadwinner Families: Their Existence, Persistence and Sources," IZA Discussion Papers 1308, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
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  7. Elena Stancanelli, 2007. "Marriage and Work: an analysis for French couples in the last decade," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2007-10, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE). [Downloadable!]
  8. Pencavel, John, 1998. "Assortative Mating by Schooling and the Work Behavior of Wives and Husbands," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 326-29, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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