From Patriarchy to Partnership : Gender Equality and Household Finance

Guided by a model of intra-household decision making in presence of social conformism, we estimate a novel measure of “domestic” gender norms that leverages variation across cohorts and regions in the gender of the household head, as reported by Italian couples surveyed over the last 30 years. We use these estimates to identify the effects of gender parity on household financial decisions. We find that more egalitarian norms increase household participation in financial markets, equity holdings, asset diversification, and returns on investments. This evidence suggests that gender roles in household financial management can have large economic costs. Consistent with this view, we show that patriarchal norms began receding in the early 1990s, when a pension reform made it too costly to comply with traditional roles