In the context of the Beckerian theory of marriage, when men and women match on a single-dimensional index that is the weighted sum of their respective multivariate attributes, many papers in the literature have used linear canonical correlation, and related techniques, in order to estimate...

Consider an economy populated by males and females, both rich and poor. The society has to choose one of the following marriage institutions: polygyny, strict monogamy, and serial monogamy (divorce and remarriage). After having identified the conditions under which each of these equilibria...

In their pioneering research, Becker, Landes and Michael (1977) found that beyond age 30 there is a positive relationship between women's age at first marriage and marital instability. They interpreted this finding as a "poor-match" effect emerging as the biological clock begins to tick. In...

We use the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) to study the relationship between marriage and health for working-age (20 to 64) individuals. In both data sets married agents are healthier than unmarried ones, and the health gap between married...

This study analyzes the marriage-market aspects of season of birth in the United States, estimating whether and how marital status is related to quarter of birth by gender and race, also incorporating cohabitation as a separate relationship status. For couples, additional analysis considers who...

The Internet has the potential to reduce search frictions by allowing individuals to identify faster a larger set of available options that conform to their preferences. One market that stands to benefit from this process is that of marriage. This paper empirically examines the implications of...

Does availability of common law marriage (CLM henceforth) in the U.S help explain variation in the labor force participation, hours of work and hours of household production of men and women over time and across states? As CLM offers more legal protection to household producers at the margin...

Children can be considered as a marriage-specific investment that increases the value of the marriage, making a divorce more costly. We exploit the richness of pre- and post-marital information from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 79, for the United States, to investigate the relation...

A woman assessing the wealth of a potential husband may observe some, but not all, of his wealth. She may screen, leading to status consumption and wasteful gift giving. The screening activity is costly not only for the potential husband, but also for the woman, as it reduces the wealth of the...

The prevalence and stability of marriage has declined in the United States as the economic lives of men and women have converged. Family change has not been uniform, however, and the widening gaps in marital status, relationship stability, and childbearing between socioeconomic groups raise...