Gender Bias in Intrahousehold Allocation: Evidence from an Unintentional Experiment
利用巴西社会项目中因官僚失误造成的自然实验，研究现金转移给母亲后家庭消费的变化，发现项目参与增加了食品支出，但这一效果并非由于女性是受益者。
We use data from a Brazilian social program to investigate the existence of gender bias in intrahousehold allocations of resources. The program makes cash transfers to mothers and pregnant women in poor households. Bureaucratic mistakes, beyond the control of the applicants, have inadvertently excluded many households that had applied and were accepted to the program. This unintentional natural experiment is used to identify the impact of an exogenous variation in female nonlabor income over household consumption. We find that program participation led to an increase in food expenditure, but this effect is not due to women being the benefit recipients. © 2012 The President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.