According to the demonstration effect theory, parents make intergenerational transfers to their elders in order to elicit a symmetric future behavior from their children. In this paper we show that upstream transfers are expected to increase with low returns from alternative financial assets and...

In this paper, we examine how children care for their elderly parents and the motives of these family transfers, accounting for interactions between parents and their different children. We study a theoretical model of intergenerational transfers based on altruism, where siblings care for their...

In this paper, we examine the old-age security hypothesis according to which parents rear children because they expect the latter to care for them in their later years. In developing countries where there are no perfect capital markets, children are usually viewed as a potential source of income...

Three theoretical hypotheses can explain the motives behind familial transfers given to the elders : altruism, exchange, and the demonstration effect theory where adults have to set an example by helping their elders if they want to be helped in turn by their children. This paper focuses on a...

In this paper, we extend the framework of the motives for familial solidarities to three generations. By focusing on upward transfers, we examine the demonstration effect hypothesis where individuals make transfers to their parents in order to be helped in return by their children. We show the...

In this note, we use the theory of incentive contracting to characterize the pattern of financial transfers within the family. Using an altruistic model based on bounded rationality with one parent and two children, we show that the parent may provide a lower gift to the less well-off child,...

This paper examines the altruistic model of bequest when a child inherits life standard aspirations from his parents. We prove that the impact of the aspiration effect on transfers can be positive or negative, depending on both the strength of inherited tastes and the coefficients of risk...