Abstract
This paper analyzes income-pooling by using a unique Danish data set that includes questions on income pooling among 1,696 couples. The analyses show that most Danish households use some kind of income pooling and that the proportion of income pooled varies considerably according to individual characteristics (age, education, occupation, past partners, upbringing) and household characteristics (household income, duration of marriage, location of residence and the existence of public goods, including children). However, when all variables are evaluated in a common model, the duration of marriage and the existence of children predominantly affect the likelihood of income pooling.
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Notes
The spouses were asked about how much they can buy for themselves without discussing it with their partner beforehand.
Both spouses were asked about their mother’s work at the labour market—full-time, part-time or no work—when they were 14 years old.
The estimation procedure applied assumes a one-way causality between the dependent and the independent variables, although this is not necessarily the case for all the relationships. In future analyses this problem of endogeneity will be addressed by using e.g. IV-estimation procedures.
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank the participants of the AEA-conference “The Rationale of Parenthood Choices” 4–5 March 2005, Pau, France, two anonymous referees and the editor of this journal for helpful comments on an earlier version of this article. Jens Bonke acknowledges financial support from The National Council of Social Research, Denmark.
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Bonke, J., Uldall-Poulsen, H. Why do families actually pool their income? Evidence from Denmark. Rev Econ Household 5, 113–128 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11150-007-9010-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11150-007-9010-5
Keywords
- Household production and intra-household allocation
- Personal income, wealth and their distributions
- Methodology for collecting, estimating, and organizing microeconomic data