Marry into new or old money? The distributional impact of marital decisions from an intergenerational perspective

Melanie Häner-Müller, Michele Salvi and Christoph Schaltegger

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2024, vol. 224, issue C, 672-687

Abstract: How sticky is wealth inequality across generations due to marital sorting? To analyze this question, we utilize a comprehensive Swiss dataset. Our findings highlight that marital sorting based on wealth is especially pronounced at the extremes of the wealth distribution, exacerbating wealth inequality. Simultaneously, we observe that the similarity in wealth between the parents of married partners is substantially less pronounced. Our findings suggest a more significant occurrence of marriages into ”new money” than ”old money”. Consequently, our study shows that parental wealth has a limited role in contributing to the inequality stemming from marital choices. We present evidence that intergenerational social mobility plays a pivotal role in counteracting the potential intensification of wealth structures due to marriage.

Keywords: Assortative mating; Parents; Intergenerational mobility; Wealth; Inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D31 J12 J62 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Working Paper: Marry into New or Old Money? The Distributional Impact of Marital Decisions from an Intergenerational Perspective (2022)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:224:y:2024:i:c:p:672-687

DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2024.06.002

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