ED Entreprise Economie Société
Three essays on intrahousehold distribution of resources and poverty
by Maira COLACCE (BSE - Bordeaux sciences économiques)
The defense will take place at 14h30 - Salle Manon Cormier Campus de Pessac, 16 av Léon Duguit, 33600 Pessac, France
in front of the jury composed of
- Olivier BARGAIN - Professeur - Université de Bordeaux - Directeur de these
- Olivier DONNI - Professeur - Université de Cergy-Pontoise - Rapporteur
- Federico PERALI - Professeur - Universitá di Verona - Rapporteur
- Delphine BOUTIN - Maître de conférences - Université de Bordeaux - Examinateur
- Marica LO BUE - Associate Professor - Università di Trieste - Examinateur
- Nicolas HERAULT - Associate Professor - université de bordeaux - Examinateur
This dissertation analyzes the patterns of intra-household inequalities in non-developed countries and how they are affected by culture and policies. Using household expenditure surveys, I employ a collective model to analyze household consumption allocation and its drivers, and to assess its implications for individual poverty. In the first chapter, I present novel findings on intra-household resource distribution for 45 low- and middle-income countries. The results reveal that women are nearly twice as poor as men on a global scale, with children experiencing even greater deprivation. Furthermore, intra-household disparities are more pronounced in poor countries and, within countries, among poor households. In the second chapter, I investigate whether kinship-based post-marital residence customs—specifically, patrilocality (residing with the groom's parents) and matrilocality (residing with the bride's parents)—continue to influence household consumption sharing and individual poverty levels in Ghana and Malawi. Analysis indicates that ancestral patrilocality, compared to matrilocality, corresponds with reduced resource allocation to women and a notably higher incidence of poverty among women across various household consumption levels. In the third chapter, I examine the impact of Uruguay's largest social assistance program, which targets poor families with children and paid to women. Employing a regression discontinuity design within a structural estimation framework, I find a significant increase in resource allocation to eligible women in rural areas, with no effects on children. I translate these results into terms of individual poverty: all family members benefit from the income effect, but the bargaining effect reduces women's poverty even more.