beyond increasing the divorce rate. They can influence female labor supply, marriage and fertility rates, child well …

Does availability of common law marriage (CLM henceforth) in the U.S help explain variation in the labor force … participation, hours of work and hours of household production of men and women over time and across states? As CLM offers more … legal protection to household producers at the margin between single status and marriage, we expect it to discourage labor …

In addition to regular marriage, Australia, Brazil, and 11 US states recognize common law (or de facto) marriage, which … allows one or both cohabiting partners to claim, under certain conditions, that an informal union is a marriage. France and … some other countries also have several types of marriage and civil union contracts. The policy issue is whether to abolish …