The impact of home production on economic inequality in Germany

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research at DIW BerlinThis series presents research findings based either directly on data from the German SocioEconomic Panel Study (SOEP) or using SOEP data as part of an internationally comparable data set (e.g. CNEF, ECHP, LIS, LWS, CHER/PACO). SOEP is a truly multidisciplinary household panel study covering a wide range of social and behavioral sciences: economics, sociology, psychology, survey methodology, econometrics and applied statistics, educational science, political science, public health, behavioral genetics, demography, geography, and sport science.The decision to publish a submission in SOEPpapers is made by a board of editors chosen by the DIW Berlin to represent the wide range of disciplines covered by SOEP. There is no external referee process and papers are either accepted or rejected without revision. Papers appear in this series as works in progress and may also appear elsewhere. They often represent preliminary studies and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be requested from the author directly. AbstractUsing representative income and time use-data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), we estimate non-monetary income advantages arising from home production and analyse their impact on economic inequality. As an alternative to existing measures, we propose a predicted wage approach based on a bias-adjusted measure of hours spent on home production. Sensitivity analyses comparing results obtained from different approaches provide indications of methodological effects arising from the choice of method. Although the substantive notion of reduced inequality is stable, the degree of variation in our findings underscores the need for a harmonized approach in cross-nationally comparative research.

The Distribution of Economic Resources to Children in Germany

“…Furthermore, the redistributive effect of parental childcare time is largely comparable with the more general findings of, for instance, Jenkins and O'Leary (1996) for the UK, Zick et al (2008) for the US, or Frick et al (2012) for Germany. The latter investigate the distributional impact of adding the value of overall home production to disposable cash income for Germany in 2009.…”

“…However, this rests on the very strong assumption that individuals can freely choose the amount of working hours in the labour market. Both assumptions are challenged by the presence of labour market rigidities, for instance, fixed working hours that are part of labour agreements (see Frick et al, 2012).…”

“…Furthermore, changes in the income distribution due to the extension of the income concept shift singles down the distribution relative to married couple families. Frick et al (2012) investigate the impact of home production on economic inequality for Germany. Their main finding is that extending cash income by the monetary value of home production has an inequality reducing effect independent of the evaluation technique and inequality measure used.…”

“…However, Frick et al (2012) neither investigate the differences between family types nor do they consider the effects of both home production and in-kind benefits.…”

Tratamiento económico y modelización del cuidado

“…La investigación empírica sugiere que la valoración del trabajo que no es de mercado tiene un fuerte efecto igualador en el ingreso y consumo prolongado (Frick et al, 2009;Frazis y Stewart, 2011;Folbre 2015). Asimismo, constituye un importante ahorro para el hogar, en tanto que todos aquellos bienes y servicios que se producen en su interior evita tener que comprarlos a precio de mercado (Dema y Díaz, 2014).…”