A theoretical model of adolescent suicide and some evidence from US data
构建了一个家庭生产与消费的贝克尔型模型,分析父母时间分配对青少年心理健康的影响,并用美国州级面板数据验证了收入增加的正效应超过父母时间减少的负效应。
Suicide rates for adolescents have doubled since 1970 and tripled since 1960, even as rates for other age groups have declined. Using a Becker-type model of household production and consumption, we demonstrate conditions under which utility maximizing parents allocate time away from time-intensive commodities like children's well-being, and towards market work and less time-intensive consumption commodities. This reallocation of time towards market work has mixed effects on children' mental health: higher money income tends to improve family and children's well-being, but the loss of parental time has an opposite effect on children's mental health and increases the risk of adolescent suicide. Empirical evidence using state panel regressions of adolescent suicide rates on economic, social and demographic variables is consistent with predictions based on our model; our results indicate that the favorable effect of higher incomes has more than offset the negative effect of lost parental time.