Sex-Ratio, divorce, and labor force participation — An analysis of international aggregate data

Abstract

It is well known that sex ratios, defined as the number of men divided by the number of women of certain age classes or the whole population, act as restrictions on the marriage market. Moreover, sex ratios are likely to influence the propensity of divorce, the labor force participation of women, and other key sociodemographic variables. Marcia Guttentag and Paul F. Secord (1983) suggested that, given male dominance in the political and legal system, higher sex ratios will correspond to more patriarchic forms of family life, traditional roles of women as housewifes and mothers and restrictive social and legal norms concerning marriage and divorce. In contrast, more liberal customs or laws on marriage and divorce are to be expected if sex ratios are relatively low. The argument outlined in ”Too many women?” is that males use their economic, political, and legal power in case of a ”shortage” of women in the relevant age groups in order to control the sexual relations of women. The two authors collected considerable empirical material both from historical and contemporary societies supporting their sex ratio theory. For example, in ancient Athens high sex ratios were parallelled by patriarchic types of households. Women in lower sex ratio Sparta, on the other hand, received good educations and were treated much less as inferiors than women in Athens. To cite another example from contemporary societies: The prevalence of women headed families and high divorce rates in the U.S. black underclass are explained at least partly by the lower sex ratio in the black population.

For critical and helpful comments I like to thank Josef Brüderl, Munich, Kim Hays, Berne, and Anatol Rapoport, Toronto.