University of Cergy-Pontoise
SUBJECT DESCRIPTION:
Over the last 50 years, industrialized countries have undergone major economic and demographic changes in both the distribution of earnings across individuals and the family structure in which these individuals live. Since the 1970s, most OECD countries experienced a sizable increase in income inequality. Meanwhile, family structure and behavior experienced deep changes. First, changes in demographic behavior have led to the emergence of new family models: decline in marriage and birth rates, delayed transitions into cohabitation, rise in divorce and single parenthood. Second, gender inequality has narrowed significantly in both educational attainment and labor force participation, leading to an increase in the share of skilled employed women and affecting household composition.
The interplay between these economic and demographic trends has remained largely unexplored. Families are indeed a key locus in the production and reproduction of inequality. Assortative mating in partner's choice might reinforce inequality between individuals. Allocative decisions within households create inequality between household with different family composition, as well as within household. Families invest resources in their children that drive their economic success in inequality therein. Understanding these phenomena is a key challenge for the analysis of inequality in modern society and for the design of efficient redistributive policies.
The main scientific goal of the ANR FAMINEQ project is to develop innovative empirical and theoretical research that allows understanding the different facets of the family-inequality nexus.
From a theoretical perspective, the project will contribute to the development of collective models of household decisions and marriage market models. Collective models of the household assume that each household member has individual preferences and that collective household decisions result from bargaining and/or cooperation between household members. Such models are essential to (a) understand how better outside opportunities for women have changed the balance of power within the household and to (b) measure changes in inequality, at the individual level, that result from recent economic and demographic trends. They will be generalized to incorporate household scale economies and to account for children. On the other hand, marriage market models explain decisions pertaining to partner's choice. They allow disentangling the respective roles of individual mating preferences and the aggregate distribution of potential partners’ characteristics in observed mating patterns. The project will seek to merge these two major research fields in family economics.
From an empirical perspective, the project will help reveal the fundamental mechanisms behind rising inequalities. One of the objectives is to provide a comprehensive assessment of assortative mating in France and other countries, focusing not only on assortativeness by education and social origin but also by economic characteristics (earnings, labor supply). Understanding mating behavior will therefore contribute to evaluate inequality between households. Another objective is to analyze how family characteristics determine the intergenerational transmission of economic advantages. Using collective models, it is possible to evaluate what parents spend on children. More generally, the influence of family background on individual success and inequality will be evaluated using until now under-exploited data sources.
The ultimate objective is to adequately measure changes in economic inequality in France and other comparable countries over the last decades, and go beyond state-of-the-art research by relying on more adequate models and better data. The project will focus on individual welfare and examine key stages of the production of inequality: changes in mating behavior and family composition, intergenerational transmission, changes in the intra-household balance of power.
THE PHD THESIS
The PhD grant is financed by the ANR FAMINEQ. The thesis will be carried out at the THEMA Research Center. It will be supervised by Olivier Donni and/or Arnaud Lefranc. The specific research subject will be discussed in coordination with the supervisor. It will concern one of the following issues that are addressed in the ANR FAMINEQ Fellowship: collective models, intergenerational transfers, empirical models of marriage, measures of the cost of children, measures of inequality.
ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA
Applicants must hold a Master's degree (or be about to earn one) or have a university degree equivalent to a European Master's (5-year duration),
The candidate must demonstrate excellent skills in
econometrics and a strong interest in economic theory.
Applicants will have to send an application letter in English and attach their last diploma, their CV, a motivation letter accompanied by a short research project. Letters of recommendation are welcome.
APPLICATION DEADLINE: 20 June 2018
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