Moving to Opportunity, Together

Seema Jayachandran, Lea Nassal, Matthew Notowidigdo, Marie Paul, Heather Sarsons and Elin Sundberg

No 26017, RFBerlin Discussion Paper Series from ROCKWOOL Foundation Berlin (RFBerlin)

Abstract: Many couples face a trade-off between advancing one spouse's career or the other's. We study this trade-off using administrative data from Germany and Sweden. Using an event study approach, we find that when couples move across commuting zones, men's earnings increase more than women's. To distinguish between two leading explanations - men's greater potential earnings and a gender norm of prioritizing men's careers - we examine how the patterns differ when the woman has the higher potential earnings. We then estimate a model of household decision-making in which households can (and do) place more weight on the man's earnings.

Keywords: Labor migration; tied movers; gender gap in earnings (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J16 J61 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-01
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