Lowering Standards to Wed? Spouse Quality, Marriage, and Labor Market Responses to the Gender Wage Gap

Abstract

This paper examines the effect of the female-to-male wage ratio, “relative wage,” on women's spouse quality, marriage, and labor supply over three decades. Exploiting task-based demand shifts as a shock to relative pay, I find that a higher relative wage (i) increases the quality of women's mates, as measured by higher spousal education, (ii) reduces marriage without substitution to cohabitation, and (iii) raises women's hours of work. These effects are consistent with a model in which a higher relative wage increases the minimum non-pecuniary benefits (“quality”) women require from a spouse and therefore reduce marriage among low-quality husbands.

Hard to get: The scarcity of women and the competition for high-income men in urban China

“…With regard to women's labor market opportunity cost from specialization in household production, recent evidence supports the implication that Becker draws from the assumption that women specialize in household production after marriage, which is that marriage rates would increase with the gender gap in wages because the gap decreases women's labor market opportunity cost from specialization in household production (Autor, Dorn, & Hanson, 2018;Shenhav, 2020). Recent evidence also confirms Becker's prediction that marriage and childbirth decrease women's labor market participation based on the assumption that women tend to specialize more than men in household production after marriage.…”

When Work Disappears: Manufacturing Decline and the Falling Marriage-Market Value of Young Men

“…Distinct from much prior work, we exploit gender dissimilarities in industry specialization to identify demand shocks that distinctly affect men's and women's employment and earnings. Our strategy thus complements work by Shenhav (2016), who uses gender-specific Bartik shocks and gender differences in occupational choice to predict changes in relative gender earnings in U.S. states. 4 We provide three main results.…”

“…The Shenhav (2016) analysis focuses on the economic independence of women rather than the declining marriagemarket value of men; it draws its empirical strategy in part on an earlier version of this paper(Autor et al, 2014a).5 Autor,Dorn and Hanson (2013a) find that trade shocks reduce CZ-level mean earningsand Chetverikov, Larsen and Palmer (2016) demonstrate that these shocks raise CZ-level earnings inequality.6 Work byAnanat et al (2013) shows that adverse local economic shocks reduce teen birthrates and sexual activity, while raising contraceptive use and abortion, whilePage et al (2007) andLindo et al (2013) document adverse impacts…”

Changes in Family Structure and Welfare Participation Since the 1960s: The Role of Legal Services

“…An implication is that criminal justice policy affects families. Shenhav (2018) and Autor, Dorn, and Hanson (2017) show that strong labor markets for women relative to men reduce marriage. An implication is that labor market policy affects families.…”