Does Sex Imbalance Affect Family Businesses? Evidence from Rural China

Yan Yuan, Zhao Rong () and Lihe Xu ()
Additional contact information
Zhao Rong: Zhongnan University of Economics and Law
Lihe Xu: Guangdong Institute for International Strategies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies

Journal of Family and Economic Issues, 2020, vol. 41, issue 1, No 2, 4-18

Abstract: Abstract This paper suggests that sex imbalance is a gender-related determinant of entrepreneurship. China has been experiencing an increasing surplus of men in the pre-marital age cohort since the late 1970s. This sex imbalance intensifies the mating competition among single men, thus stimulating households with sons to build wealth through start-up businesses. By examining households’ ownership of businesses based on a 2009 Rural Finance Survey in China, we find that son households are more likely to own businesses in villages where the sex imbalance is more severe. We further provide evidence that these son households are more capable of sustaining their businesses.

Keywords: Sex imbalance; Family business; Entrepreneurship; Rural China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D1 L26 R2 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10834-019-09644-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
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: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:jfamec:v:41:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1007_s10834-019-09644-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... es/journal/10834/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10834-019-09644-0

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Family and Economic Issues is currently edited by Joyce Serido

More articles in Journal of Family and Economic Issues from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().