This paper examines how traditional marriage market institutions affect households' financial decisions. We study how … bride-to-groom marriage payments, i.e., dowries, influence saving behavior in rural India. Exploiting variation in firstborn … gender and heterogeneity in dowry amounts across marriage markets, we find that the prospect of paying higher dowry increases …

This paper examines how traditional marriage market institutions affect households' financial decisions. We study how … bride-to-groom marriage payments, i.e., dowries, influence saving behavior in rural India. Exploiting variation in firstborn … gender and heterogeneity in dowry amounts across marriage markets, we find that the prospect of paying higher dowry increases …

differ by type of marriage and gender of the immigrant—and, consequently, affect how spouses supply labor to the market …—specialization differences, by type of marriage, are insignificant when the immigrant has post-college education. At lower levels of immigrant …

. Single women fared particularly poorly on retirement savings outcomes. A range of possible theoretical links between marriage …