Title:Economics in a Family Way

Latest revision(June, 1995)

Institution: University of Michigan, Dept of Economics
 

Comments: Postscript file, to appear in Journal of Economic Literature


This paper is an  advertisement  for some  facts and ideas that I think likely to lead to a richer theory of the economics of the family. 
The discussion references many papers from anthropology and biology.   Because of the intimate connection between the family and reproduction, it should not be surprising that there is much to be learned about the economics of the family from the study of evolutionary biology.   Given the increased prevalence  in recent decades of   unwed parenthood, divorce with sequential monogamy, and
``non-traditional'' family arrangements, it also  seems plausible that anthropological studies of alternative family structures would help us to understand our own.


The first section  presents an evolutionary theory of interpersonal 
sympathy among family members.  It discusses the genetic theory of {\em kin selection}\/ and its implications for human preferences and relate these ideas to theories of the {\em cultural evolution}\/ of preferences.  The next section takes an evolutionary viewpoint in exploring  the riddles posed by the  {\em demographic transition}\/ and  the question of intergenerational flows of wealth.
The third section discusses non-monogamous family structures in our own culture and in other cultures.  The final section draws on a more traditional source of inspiration for economists.  This section outlines an approach to bargaining theory within the family based on recent discoveries in non-cooperative game theory and discusses ways of integrating  the theory of spousal bargaining with  the theory of marriage markets.