The economies of scale of living together and how they are shared - Estimates based on a collective household model

Aline Bütikofer and Michael Gerfin

Diskussionsschriften from Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft

Abstract: How large are the economies of scale of living together? And how do partners share their resources? The first question is usually answered by equivalence scales. Traditional estimation and application of equivalence scales assumes equal sharing of income within the household. This paper uses data on financial satisfaction to simultaneously estimate the sharing rule and the economy of scale parameter in a collective household model. The estimates indicate substantial scale economies of living together, especially for couples who have lived together for some time. On average, wives receive almost 50% of household resources, but there is heterogeneity with respect to the wives contribution to household income and the duration of the relationship.

Keywords: Collective Household Models; Sharing Rule; Equivalence Scale; Subjective data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 C21 D19 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-07

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.vwl.unibe.ch/papers/dp/dp0903.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: The Economies of Scale of Living Together and How They Are Shared: Estimates Based on a Collective Household Model (2009)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ube:dpvwib:dp0903

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Diskussionsschriften from Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft
Contact information at EDIRC.
Series data maintained by Silvia Glusstein-Gerber ().