IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/eecrev/v56y2012i6p1001-1019.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Intra-household labor supply, migration, and subsistence constraints in a risky environment: Evidence from rural El salvador

Author

Listed:
  • Halliday, Timothy J.

Abstract

We investigate the use of intra-household labor allocation as a means of risk coping when subsistence constraints matter in rural El Salvador. We show that households increase the labor supply of its male members to the family farm and abroad in the US after being subjected to adverse agricultural productivity shocks. The latter is the result of a standard substitution effect, whereas the former is the result of subsistence concerns. Theoretically, these results are not at odds with each other if these events differentially impacted rich and poor households. We also show that the earthquakes of 2001 resulted in large reductions in the number of female members who were sent abroad and large increases in hours of domestic labor supplied by female members. We argue that this result is a consequence of subsistence motives because female labor supply at home increased despite lower remuneration.

Suggested Citation

  • Halliday, Timothy J., 2012. "Intra-household labor supply, migration, and subsistence constraints in a risky environment: Evidence from rural El salvador," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(6), pages 1001-1019.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:eecrev:v:56:y:2012:i:6:p:1001-1019
    DOI: 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2012.04.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0014292112000475
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2012.04.001?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Wolpin, Kenneth I, 1993. "Credit Market Constraints, Consumption Smoothing, and the Accumulation of Durable Production Assets in Low-Income Countries: Investment in Bullocks in India," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(2), pages 223-244, April.
    2. Christina Paxson, 1990. "Borrowing Constraints and Portfolio Choice," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 105(2), pages 535-543.
    3. Browning, Martin & Francois Bourguignon & Pierre-Andre Chiappori & Valerie Lechene, 1994. "Income and Outcomes: A Structural Model of Intrahousehold Allocation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(6), pages 1067-1096, December.
    4. Deaton, Angus, 1995. "Data and econometric tools for development analysis," Handbook of Development Economics, in: Hollis Chenery & T.N. Srinivasan (ed.), Handbook of Development Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 33, pages 1785-1882, Elsevier.
    5. Elizabeth Frankenberg & James P. Smith & Duncan Thomas, 2003. "Economic Shocks, Wealth, and Welfare," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 38(2).
    6. Benjamin, Dwayne, 1992. "Household Composition, Labor Markets, and Labor Demand: Testing for Separation in Agricultural Household Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(2), pages 287-322, March.
    7. Townsend, Robert M, 1994. "Risk and Insurance in Village India," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(3), pages 539-591, May.
    8. Christopher Udry, 1994. "Risk and Insurance in a Rural Credit Market: An Empirical Investigation in Northern Nigeria," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 61(3), pages 495-526.
    9. Halliday, Timothy, 2006. "Migration, Risk, and Liquidity Constraints in El Salvador," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(4), pages 893-925, July.
    10. Sonia Bhalotra, 2007. "Is Child Work Necessary?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 69(1), pages 29-55, February.
    11. Eric V. Edmonds, 2005. "Does Child Labor Decline with Improving Economic Status?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 40(1).
    12. Powell, James L., 1984. "Least absolute deviations estimation for the censored regression model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 303-325, July.
    13. Besley, Timothy, 1995. "Savings, credit and insurance," Handbook of Development Economics, in: Hollis Chenery & T.N. Srinivasan (ed.), Handbook of Development Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 36, pages 2123-2207, Elsevier.
    14. Andrew D. Foster & Mark R. Rosenzweig, 1996. "Comparative Advantage, Information and the Allocation of Workers to Tasks: Evidence from an Agricultural Labour Market," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 63(3), pages 347-374.
    15. Kaushik Basu, 2006. "Gender and Say: a Model of Household Behaviour with Endogenously Determined Balance of Power," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 116(511), pages 558-580, April.
    16. Seema Jayachandran, 2006. "Selling Labor Low: Wage Responses to Productivity Shocks in Developing Countries," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(3), pages 538-575, June.
    17. Kristin Mammen & Christina Paxson, 2000. "Women's Work and Economic Development," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 141-164, Fall.
    18. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Stark, Oded, 1989. "Consumption Smoothing, Migration, and Marriage: Evidence from Rural India," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(4), pages 905-926, August.
    19. Kaivan Munshi, 2003. "Networks in the Modern Economy: Mexican Migrants in the U. S. Labor Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 118(2), pages 549-599.
    20. Paxson, Christina H, 1992. "Using Weather Variability to Estimate the Response of Savings to Transitory Income in Thailand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(1), pages 15-33, March.
    21. Anjini Kochar, 1999. "Smoothing Consumption by Smoothing Income: Hours-of-Work Responses to Idiosyncratic Agricultural Shocks in Rural India," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(1), pages 50-61, February.
    22. Bhalotra, Sonia, 2010. "Fatal fluctuations? Cyclicality in infant mortality in India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 7-19, September.
    23. Sara Curran & Estela Rivero-Fuentes, 2003. "Engendering migrant networks: The case of Mexican migration," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 40(2), pages 289-307, May.
    24. Chiappori, Pierre-Andre, 1992. "Collective Labor Supply and Welfare," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(3), pages 437-467, June.
    25. HwaJung Choi, 2007. "Are Remittances Insurance? Evidence from Rainfall Shocks in the Philippines," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank Group, vol. 21(2), pages 219-248, May.
    26. Barzel, Yoram & McDonald, Richard J, 1973. "Assets, Subsistence, and The Supply Curve of Labor," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(4), pages 621-633, September.
    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. Gignoux, Jérémie & Menéndez, Marta, 2016. "Benefit in the wake of disaster: Long-run effects of earthquakes on welfare in rural Indonesia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 26-44.
    2. Diana De Alwis & Ilan Noy, 2019. "Sri Lankan households a decade after the Indian Ocean tsunami," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(2), pages 1000-1026, May.
    3. Afridi, Farzana & Mahajan, Kanika & Sangwan, Nikita, 2022. "The gendered effects of droughts: Production shocks and labor response in agriculture," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    4. Afridi, Farzana & Mahajan, Kanika & Sangwan, Nikita, 2021. "The Gendered Effects of Climate Change: Production Shocks and Labor Response in Agriculture," IZA Discussion Papers 14568, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Mitrut, Andreea & Wolff, François-Charles, 2014. "Remittances after natural disasters: Evidence from the 2004 Indian tsunami," Working Papers in Economics 604, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    6. Veeshan Rayamajhee & Alok K. Bohara & Virgil Henry Storr, 2020. "Ex-Post Coping Responses and Post-Disaster Resilience: a Case from the 2015 Nepal Earthquake," Economics of Disasters and Climate Change, Springer, vol. 4(3), pages 575-599, October.
    7. Ingrid Dallmann & Katrin Millock, 2013. "Climate Variability and Internal Migration: A Test on Indian Inter-State Migration," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 13045r, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne, revised Mar 2016.
    8. Tam B. Vu & Ilan Noy, 2018. "Natural Disasters and Firms in Vietnam," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(3), pages 426-452, August.
    9. Sawada, Yasuyuki & Takasaki, Yoshito, 2017. "Natural Disaster, Poverty, and Development: An Introduction," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 2-15.
    10. Cristina Cattaneo, 2016. "Opting in to Opt out? Emigration and Group Participation in Albania," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(4), pages 1046-1075, December.
    11. Bravo-Ureta, Boris E. & Njuki, Eric & Palacios, Ana Claudia & Salazar, Lina, 2022. "Agricultural Productivity in El Salvador: A Preliminary Analysis," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 11984, Inter-American Development Bank.
    12. Azreen Karim & Ilan Noy, 2016. "Poverty And Natural Disasters — A Qualitative Survey Of The Empirical Literature," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 61(01), pages 1-36, March.
    13. Eugenia Chernina, 2019. "Natural Shocks And Migration Decisions: The Case Of Kyrgyzstan," HSE Working papers WP BRP 214/EC/2019, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    14. Ingrid Dallmann & Katrin Millock, 2016. "Climate Variability and Internal Migration: A Test on Indian Inter-State Migration," Post-Print halshs-00825807, HAL.
    15. Michael Berlemann & Max Friedrich Steinhardt, 2017. "Climate Change, Natural Disasters, and Migration—a Survey of the Empirical Evidence," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo, vol. 63(4), pages 353-385.
    16. Pascaline Dupas & Jonathan Robinson, 2013. "Daily Needs, Income Targets and Labor Supply: Evidence from Kenya," NBER Working Papers 19264, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Noy, Ilan & Karim, Azreen, 2013. "Poverty, inequality and natural disasters – A survey," Working Paper Series 18793, Victoria University of Wellington, School of Economics and Finance.
    18. Mahajan, Kanika, 2017. "Rainfall Shocks and the Gender Wage Gap: Evidence from Indian Agriculture," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 156-172.

    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. Timothy J. Halliday, 2007. "Migration, Risk and the Intra-Household Allocation of Labor in El Salvador," Working Papers 200701, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Department of Economics.
    2. Junning Cai & PingSun Leung & James Mak, 2005. "Tourism's Forward and Backward Linkages," Working Papers 200516, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Department of Economics.
    3. Halliday, Timothy, 2006. "Migration, Risk, and Liquidity Constraints in El Salvador," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(4), pages 893-925, July.
    4. Dean Yang, 2009. "International Migration and Human Development," Human Development Research Papers (2009 to present) HDRP-2009-29, Human Development Report Office (HDRO), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), revised Jul 2009.
    5. Capasso, Salvatore & Neanidis, Kyriakos C., 2019. "Domestic or foreign currency? Remittances and the composition of deposits and loans," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 168-183.
    6. Parag Mahajan & Dean Yang, 2020. "Taken by Storm: Hurricanes, Migrant Networks, and US Immigration," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(2), pages 250-277, April.
    7. Andrew Dillon & Valerie Mueller & Sheu Salau, 2011. "Migratory Responses to Agricultural Risk in Northern Nigeria," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 93(4), pages 1048-1061.
    8. Giles, John, 2006. "Is life more risky in the open? Household risk-coping and the opening of China's labor markets," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 25-60, October.
    9. Daniel R. LaFave & Evan D. Peet & Duncan Thomas, 2020. "Farm Profits, Prices and Household Behavior," NBER Working Papers 26636, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Adhvaryu, Achyuta & Nyshadham, Anant, 2017. "Health, Enterprise, and Labor Complementarity in the Household," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 91-111.
    11. Diether W. Beuermann & Inder J. Ruprah & Ricardo E. Sierra, 2016. "Do remittances help smooth consumption during health shocks?: Evidence from Jamaica," Journal of Developing Areas, Tennessee State University, College of Business, vol. 50(3), pages 1-19.
    12. LaFave, Daniel & Thomas, Duncan, 2017. "Extended families and child well-being," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 52-65.
    13. Emiliano Magrini & Pierluigi Montalbano, 2012. "Trade openness and vulnerability to poverty: Vietnam in the long-run (1992-2008)," Working Paper Series 3512, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    14. Jeffrey A. Flory, 2011. "Micro-Savings & Informal Insurance in Villages: How Financial Deepening Affects Safety Nets of the Poor, A Natural Field Experiment," Working Papers 2011-008, Becker Friedman Institute for Research In Economics.
    15. Zimmerman, Frederick J. & Carter, Michael R., 2003. "Asset smoothing, consumption smoothing and the reproduction of inequality under risk and subsistence constraints," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 233-260, August.
    16. Fafchamps, Marcel & Lund, Susan, 2003. "Risk-sharing networks in rural Philippines," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 261-287, August.
    17. Kurosaki, Takashi & Fafchamps, Marcel, 2002. "Insurance market efficiency and crop choices in Pakistan," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 419-453, April.
    18. Rose, Elaina, 2001. "Ex ante and ex post labor supply response to risk in a low-income area," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 371-388, April.
    19. Yasuyuki Sawada, 2007. "The impact of natural and manmade disasters on household welfare," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 37(s1), pages 59-73, December.
    20. Emla Fitzsimons, 2007. "The Effects of Risk on Education in Indonesia," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 56(1), pages 1-25, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Migration; Labor supply; Insurance; Intra-household allocation; Subsistence constraints; Time allocation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:eee:eecrev:v:56:y:2012:i:6:p:1001-1019. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eer .

    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.