Family Members' Expenditures for Clothing Categories

Abstract

This article examines household expenditure patterns for categories of clothing; identifies major factors that influence household expenditures for different categories of clothing for men, women, boys, and girls; and analyzes income elasticities by clothing category. A sample of 1,364 husband‐wife families with at least one child aged 3 to 15 was selected from the 1984‐1985 Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Expenditure Survey. Results of tobit analysis indicate that after‐tax income was the most important determinant of clothing expenditures in concert with family characteristics. Some parents' preference‐related variables had a stronger effect on their own clothing expenditures than on children's. Although all clothing categories examined had income elasticities below 1, those categories that are thought to have a stronger function in conveying social psychological meanings tended to have higher income elasticities than the categories that have less of such a function.

Inter-regional Analysis of Household Apparel Expenditures in the United States

“…Given the reliance of these studies on economic theory for a theoretical framework, some measure of income is typically included. As economic theory predicts, empirical support for a positive relationship between income (or total expenditures) and apparel expenditures was found (Dardis et al, 1981;DeWeese, 1993;DeWeese and Norton, 1991;Douthitt and Fedyk, 1988;Nelson, 1989;Norum, 1989Norum, ,1992Wagner and Hanna, 1983;Zhang and Norton, 1995). Total consumption expenditures, used in several studies to proxy income (Dardis et aL, 1981;Nelson, 1989;Wagner and Hanna, 1983), provide a better fit in models built for prediction purposes (Dardis et al, 1981).…”

“…shirts, pants, etc.) did not include any regional information in the analysis (Zhang and Norton, 1995). Thus it was not possible to glean even limited insight into regional differences for disaggregated clothing expenditures.…”

“…Total consumption expenditures, used in several studies to proxy income (Dardis et aL, 1981;Nelson, 1989;Wagner and Hanna, 1983), provide a better fit in models built for prediction purposes (Dardis et al, 1981). The magnitude of expenditure elasticities tends to be greater than unity (Dardis et al, 1981;Nelson, 1989), whereas the magnitude of income elasticities tends to be less than unity (Dardis et al, 1981;Norum, 1989;Zhang and Norton, 1995). In addition to the income measure, a variety of socioeconomic and demographic factors, such as age, family size, education, occupation, and region, were included in the analyses.…”

“…Second, whereas researchers traditionally focused on analyzing total clothing expenditures, recent research explored disaggregated clothing expenditures (Zhang and Norton, 1995). With more detailed analyses of clothing expenditures, it is presumptuous to assume that expenditures on all sub-categories of apparel are the same among all regions.…”

“…During the past fifteen years, US clothing demand has received iucreasmg attention from academic researchers (Dardis et al, 1981;DeWeese, 1993;DeWeese and Norton, 1991;Nelson, 1989;Norum, 1989Norum, ,1992Wagner and Hanna, 1983;Zhang and Norton, 1995), Researchers measured income elasticities, explored the effect of family life cycle and composition, and analyzed the role of labor participation in clothing demand. Region, although included in many of the analyses, was not a primary focus of any of the studies.…”