IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/pubeco/v166y2018icp98-114.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Individual welfare analysis for collective households

Author

Listed:
  • Cherchye, Laurens
  • Cosaert, Sam
  • De Rock, Bram
  • Kerstens, Pieter Jan
  • Vermeulen, Frederic

Abstract

We propose novel tools for the analysis of individual welfare on the basis of aggregate household demand behavior. The method assumes a collective model of household consumption with the public and private nature of goods specified by the empirical analyst. A main distinguishing feature of our approach is that it builds on a revealed preference characterization of the collective model that is intrinsically nonparametric. We show how to identify individual money metric welfare indices from observed household demand, along with the intrahousehold sharing rule and the individuals' willingness-to-pay for public consumption (i.e. Lindahl prices). The method is easy to use in practice and yields informative empirical results, which we demonstrate through both a simulation exercise and an empirical application to labor supply data drawn from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics.

Suggested Citation

  • Cherchye, Laurens & Cosaert, Sam & De Rock, Bram & Kerstens, Pieter Jan & Vermeulen, Frederic, 2018. "Individual welfare analysis for collective households," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 98-114.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:166:y:2018:i:c:p:98-114
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2018.08.012
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272718301567
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jpubeco.2018.08.012?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. Couprie, Hélène & Peluso, Eugenio & Trannoy, Alain, 2010. "Is power more evenly balanced in poor households?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(7-8), pages 493-507, August.
    2. Jeremy Lise & Shannon Seitz, 2011. "Consumption Inequality and Intra-household Allocations," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 78(1), pages 328-355.
    3. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Arthur Lewbel & Frederic Vermeulen, 2015. "Sharing Rule Identification for General Collective Consumption Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 83(5), pages 2001-2041, September.
    4. M. Browning & P. A. Chiappori, 1998. "Efficient Intra-Household Allocations: A General Characterization and Empirical Tests," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(6), pages 1241-1278, November.
    5. P.-A. Chiappori & I. Ekeland, 2009. "The Microeconomics of Efficient Group Behavior: Identification," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 763-799, May.
    6. Oreffice, Sonia, 2011. "Sexual orientation and household decision making.: Same-sex couples' balance of power and labor supply choices," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 145-158, April.
    7. Marc Henry & Ismael Mourifié, 2013. "Euclidean Revealed Preferences: Testing The Spatial Voting Model," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 650-666, June.
    8. Richard Blundell & Pierre-Andre Chiappori & Thierry Magnac & Costas Meghir, 2007. "Collective Labour Supply: Heterogeneity and Non-Participation," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 74(2), pages 417-445.
    9. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2012. "Married with Children: A Collective Labor Supply Model with Detailed Time Use and Intrahousehold Expenditure Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3377-3405, December.
    10. Donni, Olivier, 2003. "Collective household labor supply: nonparticipation and income taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(5-6), pages 1179-1198, May.
    11. Yuichi Kitamura & Jörg Stoye, 2013. "Nonparametric analysis of random utility models: testing," CeMMAP working papers 36/13, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    12. Laurens Cherchye & Frederic Vermeulen, 2008. "Nonparametric Analysis of Household Labor Supply: Goodness of Fit and Power of the Unitary and the Collective Model," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(2), pages 267-274, May.
    13. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2009. "Opening the Black Box of Intrahousehold Decision Making: Theory and Nonparametric Empirical Tests of General Collective Consumption Models," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 117(6), pages 1074-1104, December.
    14. Geoffrey R. Dunbar & Arthur Lewbel & Krishna Pendakur, 2013. "Children's Resources in Collective Households: Identification, Estimation, and an Application to Child Poverty in Malawi," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(1), pages 438-471, February.
    15. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2007. "The Collective Model of Household Consumption: A Nonparametric Characterization," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(2), pages 553-574, March.
    16. Browning,Martin & Chiappori,Pierre-André & Weiss,Yoram, 2014. "Economics of the Family," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521795395, January.
    17. Hiroaki Kaido & Francesca Molinari & Jörg Stoye, 2019. "Confidence Intervals for Projections of Partially Identified Parameters," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(4), pages 1397-1432, July.
    18. Richard Blundell & Martin Browning & Ian Crawford, 2008. "Best Nonparametric Bounds on Demand Responses," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(6), pages 1227-1262, November.
    19. Chiappori, Pierre-Andre, 1988. "Rational Household Labor Supply," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(1), pages 63-90, January.
    20. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2011. "The revealed preference approach to collective consumption behavior: nonparametric testing and sharing rule recovery," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/98560, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    21. Richard Blundell & Pierre-André Chiappori & Costas Meghir, 2005. "Collective Labor Supply with Children," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(6), pages 1277-1306, December.
    22. Chiappori, P.A. & Ekeland, I., 2006. "The micro economics of group behavior: General characterization," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 130(1), pages 1-26, September.
    23. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2011. "The Revealed Preference Approach to Collective Consumption Behaviour: Testing and Sharing Rule Recovery," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(1), pages 176-198.
    24. Martin Browning & Mette Gørtz, 2012. "Spending Time and Money within the Household," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 114(3), pages 681-704, September.
    25. Koen Decancq & Marc Fleurbaey & Erik Schokkaert, 2015. "Happiness, Equivalent Incomes and Respect for Individual Preferences," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 82, pages 1082-1106, December.
    26. Chiappori, Pierre-Andre, 1992. "Collective Labor Supply and Welfare," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(3), pages 437-467, June.
    27. Stefan Hoderlein & Jörg Stoye, 2014. "Revealed Preferences in a Heterogeneous Population," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(2), pages 197-213, May.
    28. François Bourguignon & Martin Browning & Pierre-André Chiappori, 2009. "Efficient Intra-Household Allocations and Distribution Factors: Implications and Identification," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 76(2), pages 503-528.
    29. W. E. Diewert, 1973. "Afriat and Revealed Preference Theory," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 40(3), pages 419-425.
    30. Bart Smeulders & Laurens Cherchye & Bram Rock & Frits C. R. Spieksma & Fabrice Talla Nobibon, 2015. "Transitive preferences in multi-member households," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 3(2), pages 243-254, October.
    31. Bargain, Olivier & Donni, Olivier, 2012. "Expenditure on children: A Rothbarth-type method consistent with scale economies and parents' bargaining," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(4), pages 792-813.
    32. Varian, Hal R, 1982. "The Nonparametric Approach to Demand Analysis," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 945-973, July.
    33. Martin Browning & Pierre-André Chiappori & Arthur Lewbel, 2013. "Estimating Consumption Economies of Scale, Adult Equivalence Scales, and Household Bargaining Power," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 80(4), pages 1267-1303.
    34. 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.
    35. Fortin, Bernard & Lacroix, Guy, 1997. "A Test of the Unitary and Collective Models of Household Labour Supply," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(443), pages 933-955, July.
    36. Apps, Patricia F. & Rees, Ray, 1988. "Taxation and the household," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 355-369, April.
    37. Blundell, Richard & Kristensen, Dennis & Matzkin, Rosa, 2014. "Bounding quantile demand functions using revealed preference inequalities," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 179(2), pages 112-127.
    38. Orazio P. Attanasio & Valérie Lechene, 2014. "Efficient Responses to Targeted Cash Transfers," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 122(1), pages 178-222.
    39. Pierre-Andre Chiappori & Costas Meghir, 2014. "Intra-household Welfare," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1949, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    40. James Banks & Richard Blundell & Arthur Lewbel, 1997. "Quadratic Engel Curves And Consumer Demand," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 79(4), pages 527-539, November.
    41. Lewbel, Arthur & Pendakur, Krishna, 2008. "Estimation of collective household models with Engel curves," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 147(2), pages 350-358, December.
    42. Pierre-Andre Chiappori & Bernard Fortin & Guy Lacroix, 2002. "Marriage Market, Divorce Legislation, and Household Labor Supply," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(1), pages 37-72, February.
    43. Pierre‐André Chiappori, 2016. "Equivalence versus Indifference Scales," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0(592), pages 523-545, May.
    44. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2011. "The Revealed Preference Approach to Collective Consumption Behaviour: Testing and Sharing Rule Recovery," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 78(1), pages 176-198.
    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. Martin Browning & Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2021. "Stable marriage, household consumption and unobserved match quality," Working Papers of Department of Economics, Leuven 679647, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Department of Economics, Leuven.
    2. Obermeier, Tim, 2022. "Individual Welfare Analysis: What's the Role of Intra-Family Preference Heterogeneity?," VfS Annual Conference 2022 (Basel): Big Data in Economics 264101, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. Bárcena-Martín, Elena & Blázquez, Maite & Moro-Egido, Ana I., 2020. "The role of income pooling and decision-making responsibilities in material deprivation," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 416-428.
    4. Klein, Matthew J. & Barham, Bradford L., 2018. "Point Estimates of Household Bargaining Power Using Outside Options," Staff Paper Series 590, University of Wisconsin, Agricultural and Applied Economics.

    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. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen, 2017. "Household Consumption When the Marriage Is Stable," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(6), pages 1507-1534, June.
    2. Laurens CHERCHYE & Thomas DEMUYNCK & Bram DE ROCK, 2010. "Noncooperative household consumption with caring," Working Papers of Department of Economics, Leuven ces10.34, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Department of Economics, Leuven.
    3. Donni, Olivier & Molina, José Alberto, 2018. "Household Collective Models: Three Decades of Theoretical Contributions and Empirical Evidence," IZA Discussion Papers 11915, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock, 2011. "Revealed Preference Analysis of Non‐Cooperative Household Consumption," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(555), pages 1073-1096, September.
    5. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Arthur Lewbel & Frederic Vermeulen, 2015. "Sharing Rule Identification for General Collective Consumption Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 83(5), pages 2001-2041, September.
    6. Dieter Saelens, 2022. "Unitary or collective households? A nonparametric rationality and separability test using detailed data on consumption expenditures and time use," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 62(2), pages 637-677, February.
    7. Denni Tommasi, 2016. "Household Responses to cash Transfers," Working Papers ECARES ECARES 2016-20, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    8. Hubner, Stefan, 2016. "Topics in nonparametric identification and estimation," Other publications TiSEM 08fce56b-3193-46e0-871b-0, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. Laurens CHERCHYE & Bram DE ROCK & Jeroen SABBE & Ewout VERRIEST, 2010. "Commitment in intertemporal household consumption: a revealed preference analysis," Working Papers of Department of Economics, Leuven ces10.33, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Department of Economics, Leuven.
    10. Hubner, Stefan, 2023. "Identification of unobserved distribution factors and preferences in the collective household model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 234(1), pages 301-326.
    11. De Rock, Bram & Cherchye, Laurens & Chiappori, Pierre-André & Ringdal, Charlotte & Vermeulen, Frederic, 2021. "Feed the children," CEPR Discussion Papers 16482, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Laurens Cherchye & Sam Cosaert & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock, 2020. "Group Consumption with Caring Individuals," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 130(627), pages 587-622.
    13. Denni Tommasi & Alexander Wolf, 2016. "Overcoming Weak Identification in the Estimation of Household Resource Shares," Working Papers ECARES ECARES 2016-12, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    14. Bram De Rock & Tom Potoms & Denni Tommasi, 2022. "Household Responses to Cash Transfers," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 70(2), pages 625-652.
    15. Sabrina Bruyneel & Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock, 2012. "Collective consumption models with restricted bargaining weights: an empirical assessment based on experimental data," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 10(3), pages 395-421, September.
    16. Cherchye, L.J.H. & Demuynck, T. & de Rock, B., 2009. "Degrees of Cooperation in Household Consumption Models : A Revealed Preference Analysis," Other publications TiSEM 097597d5-7724-4d31-b044-e, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    17. Brown, Caitlin & Calvi, Rossella & Penglase, Jacob, 2021. "Sharing the pie: An analysis of undernutrition and individual consumption in Bangladesh," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    18. Sam Cosaert & Alexandros Theloudis & Bertrand Verheyden, 2023. "Togetherness in the Household," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 15(1), pages 529-579, February.
    19. Calvi, Rossella & Penglase, Jacob & Tommasi, Denni & Wolf, Alexander, 2023. "The more the poorer? Resource sharing and scale economies in large families," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 160(C).
    20. Geoffrey R. Dunbar & Arthur Lewbel & Krishna Pendakur, 2021. "Identification of Random Resource Shares in Collective Households Without Preference Similarity Restrictions," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(2), pages 402-421, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Individual welfare; Collective model; Revealed preferences; Sharing rule; Money metric welfare index; Identification; Labor supply;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D11 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Theory
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation
    • C14 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods: General

    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:pubeco:v:166:y:2018:i:c:p:98-114. 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/inca/505578 .

    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.