Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina

Theory predicts that economies of scale associated with the consumption of shared household public goods make larger families better off, given the same level of per capita expenditure or income. Public goods are relatively cheaper, while per capita expenditure on the private good will increase, as...

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Autores principales: Echeverría, Lucía, Molina, José Alberto
Formato: Artículo draft
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:http://nulan.mdp.edu.ar/3622/
http://nulan.mdp.edu.ar/3622/1/echeverria-molina-2022.pdf
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id I29-R1353622
record_format dspace
institution Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (UNMdP)
institution_str I-29
repository_str R-135
collection Nulan - Fac.Cs.Económicas (UNMdP)
language Inglés
orig_language_str_mv eng
topic Leyes de Engel
Tamaño de Hogar
Economías de Escala
Consumo de Alimentos
spellingShingle Leyes de Engel
Tamaño de Hogar
Economías de Escala
Consumo de Alimentos
Echeverría, Lucía
Molina, José Alberto
Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
description Theory predicts that economies of scale associated with the consumption of shared household public goods make larger families better off, given the same level of per capita expenditure or income. Public goods are relatively cheaper, while per capita expenditure on the private good will increase, as long as it is not easily substitutable, as in the case of food. However, Deaton and Paxson (1998) found exactly the opposite: food share declines with the number of heads, keeping household per capita expenditure constant. This paper aims to better understand the heterogeneities underlying the Deaton-Paxson paradox in food consumption, using data from the Argentinean Household Expenditure Survey (ENGH, Spanish acronym) for the period 2017/2018. We first differentiate the impact of an additional adult from an additional child on food demand, in families of different sizes. Second, we evaluate the relationship between food demand and household size on the distribution of income. Third, we explore potential associations beyond the conditional mean of food consumption. Because standard analysis focuses on average effects of family size on food demand, the existence of the paradox at the lower and upper end of the conditional food distribution remains unknown. Our evidence supports the findings of Deaton and Paxson (1998), and reveals important differences driving this food puzzle. Our results shed light on the crucial role of economies of scale in poor households.
format Artículo
Artículo
draft
author Echeverría, Lucía
Molina, José Alberto
author_facet Echeverría, Lucía
Molina, José Alberto
author_sort Echeverría, Lucía
title Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
title_short Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
title_full Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
title_fullStr Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
title_full_unstemmed Exploring household heterogeneities of the Deaton-Paxson puzzle: Evidence for Argentina
title_sort exploring household heterogeneities of the deaton-paxson puzzle: evidence for argentina
publishDate 2022
url http://nulan.mdp.edu.ar/3622/
http://nulan.mdp.edu.ar/3622/1/echeverria-molina-2022.pdf
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AT molinajosealberto exploringhouseholdheterogeneitiesofthedeatonpaxsonpuzzleevidenceforargentina
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