Economics and family structures

Household decisions are one of the key elements impacting many dimensions of any economy. Decisions at the household level, have strong repercussions at the macroeconomic level. For instance, decisions regarding how much to save, a ect the economy investment possibilities, or decisions regarding children's education a ect the overall level of human capital. Economists who study household behaviour have focused on the understanding of nuclear families. However, family types are heterogeneous across and within countries, both in the past and in present times. This paper reviews the economic literature on family types, focusing on nuclear, stem, and complex families. We establish how each family type could relate to the basic ingredients of standard structural models of household decisions. This overview sets the stage for an interesting research avenue to improve the structural models of household decision making. The focus on nuclear families limits our capacity to analyse the impact of institutional phenomena or public policies. More research to understand the determinants and functioning of other types of families hence matters both from an academic and a policy perspective.