Families as Roommates: Changes in U.S. Household Size from 1850 to 2000

41 Pages Posted: 9 Nov 2009 Last revised: 17 Apr 2022

See all articles by Alejandrina Salcedo

Alejandrina Salcedo

affiliation not provided to SSRN

Todd Schoellman

Federal Reserve Banks - Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis

Michèle Tertilt

University of Mannheim - Department of Economics

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: November 2009

Abstract

Living arrangements have changed enormously over the last two centuries. While the average American today lives in a household of only three people, in 1850 household size was twice that figure. Further, both the number of children and the number of adults in a household have fallen dramatically. We develop a simple theory of household size where living with others is beneficial solely because the costs of household public goods can be shared. In other words, we abstract from intra-family relations and focus on households as collections of roommates. The model's mechanism is that rising income leads to a falling expenditure share on household public goods, which endogenously makes household formation less beneficial and privacy more attractive. To assess the magnitude of this mechanism, we first calibrate the model to match the relationship between household size, consumption patterns, and income in the cross-section at the end of the 20th century. We then project the model back to 1850 by changing income. We find that our proposed mechanism can account for 37 percent of the decline in the number of adults in a household between 1850 and 2000, and for 16 percent of the decline in the number of children.

Suggested Citation

Salcedo, Alejandrina and Schoellman, Todd and Tertilt, Michèle, Families as Roommates: Changes in U.S. Household Size from 1850 to 2000 (November 2009). NBER Working Paper No. w15477, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1501502

Alejandrina Salcedo

affiliation not provided to SSRN ( email )

No Address Available

Todd Schoellman

Federal Reserve Banks - Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis ( email )

90 Hennepin Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55480
United States

Michèle Tertilt (Contact Author)

University of Mannheim - Department of Economics ( email )

D-68131 Mannheim
Germany

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

Paper statistics

Downloads
37
Abstract Views
499
PlumX Metrics