Gaps in welfare attainment between boys and girls in China have attractedinternational attention. In this paper demand analysis is used to try and uncoverthe factors which may be driving the emergence of these gender gaps.Drawing on household expenditure data from a poor (Sichuan) and rich...

We report a surprising property of u-o-preferences: the assumption of nonincreasing relative risk aversion implies the optimal portfolio being riskless. We discuss a solution of that paradox in detail. (JEL D80, G11, D10).

The Surveys of Consumers has been conducted by the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan since 1946. Each month, 500 individuals are randomly selected from the contiguous United States (48 states plus the District of Columbia) to participate in the Surveys of Consumers. The...

This paper explores the macroeconomic consequences of preferences displaying asubsistence point. It departs from the existing related literature by assuming thatsubsistence points are specific to each variety of goods rather than to the compositeconsumption good. We show that this simple feature...

This paper uses mortgage data to construct a measure of terms on which households access to externalfinance, and relates it to consumption at both the aggregate and cohort levels. The Household ExternalFinance (HEF) index is based on the spread paid by risky borrowers in the mortgage market....

This paper uses a unique data set on more than 600,000 mortgagecontracts to estimate a credit supply function which allows for risk-heterogeneity. Non-linearity is modeled using quantile regressions. Wepropose an instrumental variable approach in which changes in the taxtreatment of housing...

The evidence strongly suggests a robust negative relationship between income and fertility, anda positive relationship between income and longevity. This is puzzling for standard dynamicmodels. For instance, altruistic models that use the most standard preferences in macro-timeseparable CRRA...

Malnutrition and food deprivation, which are concentrated in poor countries, have been along-term concern of economists, but as per capita income in developed countries has grown in the20th century, a new problem of over-nutrition leading to obesity has occurred. This paper developsmodels of...

This paper provides a first microeconomic foundation for the institution of marriage. Based on a model of reproduction, mating, and parental investment in children, we argue that marriage serves the purpose of attenuating the risk of mating market failure that arises from incomplete information...

We develop a theoretical model of mating behavior and parental investment in children under asymmetry in kin recognition between men and women that provides a microfoundation for the institution of marriage. In the model, men and women derive utility from consumption and reproductive success,...