This paper considers whether empirical evidence exists that is consistent with the view of income redistribution as human capital insurance. If parents can invest in their children with schooling and bequests, but the returns to schooling are risky because diversification is limited, then, in...

How much of the rise in women's labor supply associated with divorce can be attributed to observable changes in the wife's environment? Such changes include a reduction in nonwage family income, a rise in her after-tax wage rate, changes in the number of children present, and a reduction in...

Hours constraints are typically identified by worker responses to questions asking whether they would prefer a job with more hours and more pay or fewer hours and less pay. Because jobs with different hours but the same rate of pay may be infeasible when there are fixed costs of employment or...

Four propositions that have been advanced on the basis of verbal intuition are considered. They are given precise interpretation in a formal model and then disproved. The propositions concern intergenerational transfers through schooling; in particular ...