The Economics of Parenting

Abstract

Parenting decisions are among the most consequential choices that people make throughout their lives. Starting with the work of pioneers such as Gary Becker, economists have used the tool set of their discipline to understand what parents do and how parents’ actions affect their children. In recent years, the literature on parenting within economics has increasingly leveraged findings and concepts from related disciplines that also deal with parent–child interactions. For example, economists have developed models to understand the choice among various parenting styles that were first explored in the developmental psychology literature and have estimated detailed empirical models of children's accumulation of cognitive and noncognitive skills in response to parental and other inputs. In this review, we survey the economic literature on parenting and point out promising directions for future research.