Publication Type

Working Paper

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

6-2023

Abstract

Parents in many countries exhibit a strong preference for sons over daughters; a preference that is often observed regarding transfers to children. Here, we ask whether son preference also drives differences in behavior regarding transfers from sons and daughters. We use data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) to examine the patterns of giving to parents and find strong evidence of such differentiation. Coresidential support comes almost exclusively from sons as do large transfers, while daughters are more likely to make small transfers. Moreover, crowding-out of financial transfers by siblings occurs primarily within gender: sons give less when they have more brothers, and daughters give less when they have more sisters, a pattern that exists for both cash and in-kind transfers. These results provide strong evidence of separate spheres or “mental accounts” for upward family transfers and suggest that sons and daughters are still viewed quite differently.

Keywords

brothers, sisters, old age support, separate spheres, mental accounting

Discipline

Economics | Family, Life Course, and Society

Research Areas

Applied Microeconomics

First Page

1

Last Page

68

Publisher

Paper No. 12-2023

Copyright Owner and License

Authors

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