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Models of Resource Distribution in the Family in Taiwan

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The Family and Social Change in Chinese Societies

Part of the book series: The Springer Series on Demographic Methods and Population Analysis ((PSDE,volume 35))

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Abstract

Much of the literature in economics on household decision-making assumes (either explicitly or implicitly) that the household maximizes a unique utility function given a set of constraints dictated by the household budget and the available domestic production technology. This approach treats the resource allocation mechanism in the household as a “black box” (or more precisely as a single homogeneous unit); it has the virtue of simplicity and convenience in explaining household behavior, but in many ways it contradicts the essence of micro-economic theory which stresses that the behaviors of individuals are characterized by their own preferences. Aggregating a group of individuals into a household hence involves invoking assumptions that are neither theoretically appealing nor empirically applicable in dealing with the intra-household resource allocation decision-making.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Although there are several contexts in the bargaining model, in the discussion of several persons in a household, the bargaining process could be represented by this product type, and this model could be a general form of the household bargaining process.

  2. 2.

    The PSFD started from the “core respondents” survey (prefixed by R), and extended to the respondents’ parents (prefixed by P), children (prefixed by C), and siblings (prefixed by S).

  3. 3.

    The PSFD provides over 12 categories of educational levels; we transformed each category to years of education; we used the same method when analyzing the TSCS data (below).

  4. 4.

    The “Relationship between couples” scores are from 1 to 5; 1 is the worst and 5 is the best.

  5. 5.

    The PSFD asked the respondent: how did you meet your spouse and get married? We separated the case that relatives or parents play as match-maker from the case of love-match to marry.

  6. 6.

    Satisfaction of marriage in TSCS is categorized into four levels as very satisfied, satisfied, dissatisfied, and very dissatisfied. Most respondents report very satisfied and satisfied, so we separated very satisfied from the others.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Chi-Nan University, Nantou, Taiwan, ROC

    Chien-Liang Chen

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  1. Chien-Liang Chen
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Correspondence to Chien-Liang Chen .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, Texas A & M University, College Station, Texas, USA

    Dudley L. Poston, Jr.

  2. Academia Sinica Inst. Social Sciences & Philosophy, Nankang, Taipei, Taiwan

    Wen Shan Yang

  3. Department of Behavioral Sciences, University of West Alabama, Livingston, Alabama, USA

    Demetrea Nicole Farris

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Chen, CL. (2014). Models of Resource Distribution in the Family in Taiwan. In: Poston, Jr., D., Yang, W., Farris, D. (eds) The Family and Social Change in Chinese Societies. The Springer Series on Demographic Methods and Population Analysis, vol 35. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7445-2_1

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