Fatter attraction: anthropometric and socieconomic matching on the marriage market

Pierre Chiapore (pc2167@columbia.edu), Climent Quintana Domeque and Sonia Oreffice
Additional contact information
Pierre Chiapore: Economics Department, Columbia University
Climent Quintana Domeque: Universidad de Alicante
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Pierre Chiappori and Climent Quintana-Domeque

Working Papers. Serie AD from Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie)

Abstract: We construct a matching model on the marriage market along more than one characteristic, where individuals have preferences over physical attractiveness (proxied by anthropometric characteristics) and market and household productivity of potential mates (proxied by socioeconomic characteristics), with a certain degree of substitutability between them. Men and women assess each other through an index combining these various attributes, so the matching is one-dimensional. We estimate the sorting and trade-offs among these characteristics using data from the PSID, finding evidence of compensation between anthropometric and socioeconomic characteristics for both genders, and of equality of these marginal rates of substitution across traits. Among men, a 10% increase in BMI can be compensated by a higher wage, the supplement being estimated to be around 3%. Similarly, for women, an additional year of education may compensate up to three BMI units.

Keywords: BMI; marriage market; wages; education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D1 J1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 1 pages
Date: 2010-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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Working Paper: Fatter Attraction: Anthropometric and Socioeconomic Matching on the Marriage Market (2010)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ivi:wpasad:2010-23

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