Bargaining Under Threats

Daniel Fernández-Kranz, Natalia Nollenberger and Jennifer Roff

American Journal of Health Economics, 2026, vol. 12, issue 1, 118 - 163

Abstract: We exploit a quasi-natural experiment based on a series of reforms in Spain that improved fathers’ bargaining power by shifting the custody decision from being unilaterally determined by the mother to a joint decision. Employing a triple-difference specification that compares women with and without children in treated and control regions before and after the reforms, we find that the policy led to a large and significant decrease in intimate partner violence (−43.3 percent), with the largest effects among women over 30 and in regions with low take-up rates. Our results are in line with previous studies that find that women empowerment may lead to an increase of intimate partner violence in societies with strong gender norms as male partners see their status being threatened (Angelucci and Heath 2020; Heath 2014; García-Ramos 2021; Hoehn-Velasco and Silverio-Murillo 2020).

Date: 2026
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