Dowry and Intrahousehold Bargaining: Evidence from China
利用中国农村家庭数据，以嫁妆作为议价能力的代理变量，并用婚前一年的粮食冲击作为工具变量，发现嫁妆能显著提升妻子在家庭中的福利，支持集体家庭模型。
This paper analyzes the relationship between a woman's intrahousehold bargaining position and her welfare within marriage using household data from rural China. Simultaneity problems are overcome by using dowry to proxy for bargaining position. Omitted variable bias is addressed by using grain shocks in the year preceding marriage as an instrument for dowry. Instrumented dowry positively impacts numerous measures of a wife's welfare, including household purchases, the time allocation of household members, and the woman's satisfaction with life, offering strong evidence in support of collective models of the household.