Love and Money by Parental Matchmaking: Evidence from Urban Couples in China
Fali Huang, Ginger Zhe Jin, Lixin Colin Xu
American Economic Review · 2012 · Volume 102 · Issue 3
Abstract
Parental involvement in marriage matchmaking may distort the optimal spouse choice because parents are willing to substitute love for money. The rationale is that the joint income of married children can be shared among extended family members more easily than mutual attraction felt by the couple themselves, and as a result, the best spouse candidate in the parents' eyes can differ from what is optimal to the individual, even though parents are altruistic and care dearly about their children's welfare. We find supporting evidence for this prediction using a unique sample of urban couples in China in the early 1990s.
Keywords
Economic Development: Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis, Housing, Infrastructure, Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies: Urban, and Regional Economics, Marriage, Marital Dissolution, Family Structure, Domestic Abuse, Economic Development: Human Resources, Human Development, Income Distribution, Migration, Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions: Consumer Economics, Health, Education and Training: Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty, Urban, and Transportation Economics: Regional Migration, Regional Labor Markets, Population, Neighborhood Characteristics
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