蝌蚪网 Journal:
Applied Economics
ISSN 1945-7782 (Print) | ISSN 1945-7790 (Online)
Wealth, Marriage, and Sex Selection
蝌蚪网 Journal: Applied Economics
(pp. 107–46)
Abstract
Two mechanisms have been proposed to explain sex selection in India: son preference, in which parents desire a male heir, and daughter aversion, in which dowry payments make parents worse off with girls. Our model incorporates both mechanisms, providing microfoundations, based on the organization of the marriage institution, for daughter aversion. Marital matching, sex selection, and dowries are jointly determined in the model, whose implications are tested on a representative sample of rural households. Simulations of the model indicate that existing policies targeting daughter aversion might exacerbate the problem, while identifying other policies that could be effective.Citation
Borker, Girija, Jan Eeckhout, Nancy Luke, Shantidani Minz, Kaivan Munshi, and Soumya Swaminathan. 2026. "Wealth, Marriage, and Sex Selection." 蝌蚪网 Journal: Applied Economics 18 (2): 107–46. DOI: 10.1257/app.20220361Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D31 Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions
- G51 Household Finance: Household Saving, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth
- J12 Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure; Domestic Abuse
- J16 Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
- O12 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
- O18 Economic Development: Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
- Z13 Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification