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Competing Pre-marital Investments

Author Info

Listed author(s):
  • Michael Peters
  • Aloysius Siow

Abstract

Pre-marital investments by spouses are largely viewed as public goods within the marriage. So individuals may underinvest. But individuals also use their investments to compete for spouses with higher investments. In a large marriage market, the higher equilibrium match quality obtained by increasing pre-marital investment exactly internalizes the external benefit of the investment so the competitive equilibrium is effcient. This model of competing investments in local public goods is a special case of Rosen's hedonic market model. In small marriage markets, the competition for spouses will raise incentives to invest in pre-marital investments as well as making these investments less predictable.

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File URL: https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/public/workingPapers/UT-ECIPA-PETERS-00-01.pdf
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Paper provided by University of Toronto, Department of Economics in its series Working Papers with number peters-00-01.

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Length: 27 pages
Date of creation: 13 Jan 2000
Handle: RePEc:tor:tecipa:peters-00-01
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  1. Peters, Michael, 2000. "Limits of Exact Equilibria for Capacity Constrained Sellers with Costly Search," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 139-168, December.
  2. Maristella Botticini & Aloysius Siow, 2003. "Why Dowries?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(4), pages 1385-1398, September.
  3. Leonardo Felli & Kevin Roberts, 2016. "Does Competition Solve the Hold-up Problem?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 83(329), pages 172-200, 01.
  4. Aloysius Siow & Xiaodong Zhu, 1998. "Differential Fecundity and Gender Biased Parental Investment," Working Papers siow-99-03, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
  5. Kahn, Shulamit & Lang, Kevin, 1988. "Efficient Estimation of Structural Hedonic Systems," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 29(1), pages 157-166, February.
  6. Bergstrom, Theodore & Blume, Lawrence & Varian, Hal, 1986. "On the private provision of public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 25-49, February.
  7. Kai A. Konrad & Kjell Erik Lommerud, 2000. "The bargaining family revisited," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 33(2), pages 471-487, May.
  8. Lones Smith, 2006. "The Marriage Model with Search Frictions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(6), pages 1124-1146, December.
  9. Daron Acemoglu, 1997. "Training and Innovation in an Imperfect Labour Market," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 64(3), pages 445-464.
  10. Philip J. Reny, 1999. "On the Existence of Pure and Mixed Strategy Nash Equilibria in Discontinuous Games," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(5), pages 1029-1056, September.
  11. Becker, Gary S, 1973. "A Theory of Marriage: Part I," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(4), pages 813-846, July-Aug..
  12. Harold L. Cole & George J. Mailath & Andrew Postlewaite, "undated". "Efficient Non-Contractible Investments," Penn CARESS Working Papers 08d6793d32cab8f6e1f46dac0, Penn Economics Department.
  13. Beth Allen & Martin Hellwig, 1986. "Bertrand-Edgeworth Oligopoly in Large Markets," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 53(2), pages 175-204.
  14. Moen, Espen R, 1997. "Competitive Search Equilibrium," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(2), pages 385-411, April.
  15. MacLeod, W Bentley & Malcomson, James M, 1993. "Investments, Holdup, and the Form of Market Contracts," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(4), pages 811-837, September.
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