 Assortative Mating and Earnings Inequality in FranceNicolas Frémeaux and Arnaud Lefranc Review of Income and Wealth, 2020, vol. 66, issue 4, 757-783 Abstract: This paper analyzes assortative mating and its contribution to inequality in France. We first provide descriptive evidence on the statistical association in several socio‐economic attributes of partners. Second, we assess the contribution of assortative mating to earnings inequality between couples. We provide a new method for assessing the contribution of assortative mating to inequality in couple’s potential earnings, that accounts for selection bias arising from labor force participation. Our results indicate a strong degree of assortative mating in France. The correlation in earnings is around 0.17 for annual earnings, around 0.35 for full‐time equivalent earnings and up to 0.49 when using multi‐year average earnings. Assortative mating tends to increase inequality among couples. For annual earnings, the effect accounts for 3 to 9 percent of measured inequality. The effect of assortative mating on household potential earnings is much larger and amounts to 10 to 20 percent for observed inequality. Date: 2020 Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:revinw:v:66:y:2020:i:4:p:757-783 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article Review of Income and Wealth is currently edited by Conchita D'Ambrosio and Robert J. Hill More articles in Review of Income and Wealth from International Association for Research in Income and Wealth Contact information at EDIRC. |
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