Intra-family distribution in developing countries

Abstract

Intra-household allocations appear to be quite important in the determination of time use, human resource investments, and intra- and inter-generational transfers in developing countries. In the past decade and a half, there has been substantial progress in modelling intra-household allocations in ways that lead to testable propositions. The parent-child exchange literature is a subset of these studies that advances in two dimensions by allowing children to have different preferences from their parents' and by incorporating a broader notion of interactions, including the attention provided by the children to their parents. Yet this literature has most of the problems that are indicated with regard to the unified household preference models. Interesting theoretical results have been derived concerning the conditions under which the income-sharing rules and the allocation of non-assignable goods can be derived. But the literature on the collective models of household behaviours is static and gives little consideration to the dynamic processes and learning. -from Author