The Western European marriage pattern and economic development

Foreman-Peck, James ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9826-5725 2009. The Western European marriage pattern and economic development. [Working Paper]. Cardiff Economics Working Papers, Cardiff: Cardiff University.

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Abstract

For several centuries, women’s age at first marriage in Western Europe was higher than in the east (and in the rest of the world). Over the same period Western Europe began slow but sustained economic development relative to elsewhere. A model based on the economics of the household explains this association in two related ways. Both connect mortality, and the exercise of fertility restraint through higher marriage age, with greater human capital accumulation. The first explanation is simply an association but the second proposes a causal link where higher age of motherhood reduced the cost of investment in children. Evidence is provided that the causal process was operative in later nineteenth century Europe

Item Type:	Monograph (Working Paper)
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HB Economic Theory
Publisher:	Cardiff University
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	30 March 2016
Last Modified:	28 Oct 2022 10:19
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/77828

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