Who Bears the Full Costs of Children?

33 Pages Posted: 4 Mar 2010

See all articles by Federico Perali

Federico Perali

University of Verona - Department of Economics

Antonella Caiumi

European Union - Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN)

Date Written: January 8, 2010

Abstract

This paper measures how the costs of children are shared between the father and the mother by estimating a gender specific demand system related to the demand for market goods, household products and leisure within a collective approach. The estimates illustrate how the intra-household distribution of resources varies across households with and without children and how wages and non-labor income affect the allocation rule in both one-earner and double-earner households. In the presence of a child, both parents, but mothers especially, increase their involvement in home production at the expense of the enjoyment of leisure. This commitment decreases as the child gets older. In general, mothers control less than half of the household resources, while they bear more than half of the cost of maintaining a child.

Keywords: cost of children, intra-household allocation, household production, full income, sharing rule

JEL Classification: D12, D13, J22

Suggested Citation

Perali, Federico and Caiumi, Antonella, Who Bears the Full Costs of Children? (January 8, 2010). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1540468 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1540468

Federico Perali (Contact Author)

University of Verona - Department of Economics ( email )

via dell'Artigliere, 19
I-37129 Verona
Italy

Antonella Caiumi

European Union - Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN) ( email )

BU-1 05/190
Brussels, Bruxelles B-1049
Belgium

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
67
Abstract Views
667
Rank
608,061
PlumX Metrics