An Economic Analysis Of The Family

What do economists have to say about behavior within the context of the family? This book improves our understanding of how families and markets interact, why important aspects of families have been changing in recent decades, and how families respond to, and are affected by, public policy. It covers a broader range of topics with more consistency than have previous studies, including all major theoretical developments in the field over the past decade. John Ermisch builds his analysis on the premise that the standard analytical methods of microeconomics can help us understand resource allocation and the distribution of welfare within the family. Families are dynamic institutions--and so the author uses these same methods to study family formation and dissolution (including marriage, fertility, and divorce) and household formation, as well as intergenerational transfers, household production and investment, and bargaining between family members. He also shows how economic theories of the family can help guide and structure empirical analyses of demographic and related phenomena, such as labor supply, child support, and returns to education. Examples of studies that apply the theory are provided throughout the book. The most comprehensive and up-to-date introduction to an increasingly dynamic area of research, one with important implications for public policy, An Economic Analysis of the Family will be a valuable resource for advanced students of microeconomics and also for students and researchers in sociology, psychology, and other social sciences.

Gary Becker sees the family as a kind of little factory - a multiperson unit producing meals, health, skills, children and self-esteem from market goods and the time, skills, and knowledge of its members. Gary Becker won the 1992 Nobel Prize in Economics.

This 1991 book analyzes the flows into and out of lone parenthood, using demographic and employment histories from a British national survey carried out in 1980. It also studies the lone parents' movements into and out of paid employment, and the effect of welfare benefits on their employment.

What do economists have to say about behavior within the context of the family? This book improves our understanding of how families and markets interact, why important aspects of families have been changing in recent decades, and how families respond to, and are affected by, public policy. It covers a broader range of topics with more consistency than have previous studies, including all major theoretical developments in the field over the past decade. John Ermisch builds his analysis on the premise that the standard analytical methods of microeconomics can help us understand resource allocation and the distribution of welfare within the family. Families are dynamic institutions--and so the author uses these same methods to study family formation and dissolution (including marriage, fertility, and divorce) and household formation, as well as intergenerational transfers, household production and investment, and bargaining between family members. He also shows how economic theories of the family can help guide and structure empirical analyses of demographic and related phenomena, such as labor supply, child support, and returns to education. Examples of studies that apply the theory are provided throughout the book. The most comprehensive and up-to-date introduction to an increasingly dynamic area of research, one with important implications for public policy, An Economic Analysis of the Family will be a valuable resource for advanced students of microeconomics and also for students and researchers in sociology, psychology, and other social sciences.

Patricia Morgan's core assumption is that the family is an extremely effective vehicle for raising the welfare of its members. If this is correct it is quite possible that the state can best support the family by doing very little--by not taxing the family heavily and by minimizing the subsidization of those who choose alternatives to financially self-sustaining family life. At one level, Morgan argues, the family can be seen as a unit within which there occurs enormous transfer of economic resources between husband and wife, parents and children, and, on a wider scale, within extended families. The family is the most important vehicle of welfare and the welfare vehicle of first resort. Within the family many services are provided by family members to each other, rarely for direct personal benefit. Basic economic analysis, Morgan asserts, suggests that the family could be seriously undermined if the state provided significant support for dependents who are not brought up within self-sustaining family units, and if it also provided services, such as childcare, that are generally provided within families. This work shows that this is precisely what has happened in the last twenty-five years. The driving force of significantly reduced family formation is not economic but social. Perhaps social changes have led to a desire by individuals to bring up children in family circumstances different from those of a generation or two ago, but evidence does not support this hypothesis. Rather, tax and benefit systems seem to be important determinants of family structure worldwide. Patricia Morgan does not simply analyze the problem, she also suggests policy solutions. The author argues that divorce laws should be reformed to ensure that those who make commitments are held financially responsible. The author's argument is compelling because it is backed up with strong evidence and is argued from an unemotional economic perspective--individuals within families are rational agents who respond to incentives.

Revised, updated and in paperback, studies altruistic and nonaltruistic motives for transfers between families and groups.