Sorting in marriage markets: The role of non-wage amenities

Andrew Judy, Iris Kesternich, Isadora Mathevet and Christian Pugnaghi-Zimpelmann

No 90, WiSo-HH Working Paper Series from University of Hamburg, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences, WISO Research Laboratory

Abstract: Partners often match on similar characteristics, such as demographics and wages, contributing to inequality between households. We study whether non-wage job amenities - an important part of compensation in the labor market that may also affect household production - play a role in marriage sorting. Using linked survey and administrative data from Germany, we infer individuals' expected future job attributes from their jobs at the time of matching and estimate a frictionless transferable-utility model. We find positive assortative matching on lifetime earnings, part-time work potential, and schedule regularity, suggesting complementarities within households. In contrast, we find no evidence of sorting on work meaning. Counterfactual simulations show that while assortative matching increases inequality overall, sorting on non-wage amenities slightly reduces it, lowering the Gini coefficient of total compensation by 3.3 percent.

Keywords: marriage market; assortative matching; non-wage amenities; household inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D1 D31 J12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Working Paper: Sorting in Marriage Markets: The Role of Non-Wage Amenities (2026)
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