Dowry Inflation Research Articles

Dowry Inflation: Perception or Reality?

Dowry Inflation: Perception or Reality?

‘ARRANGED’ MARRIAGE, EDUCATION, AND DOWRY: A CONTRACT-THEORETIC PERSPECTIVE

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)1.INTRODUCTION: BACKGROUNDDowry is characterised by asymmetry, uncertainty and unpredictability (Srinivas, 1989).This paper provides a framework to explore interconnections among marriage, education, and dowry essentially in an incomplete information setting. The hypothesis is that when the quality of the groom is not directly observable, then education level of the groom as well as dowry transacted at the time of marriage, help to screen grooms of different qualities. In equilibrium, different types of grooms select different education-dowry contracts, with higher/better types being associated with both higher education and higher dowry. Hence by imparting to education an Arrow-Spence-Stiglitz (Arrow, 1973; Spence, 1973; Stiglitz, 1975) kind of screening role, we are able to explain the perverse (positive) relation between education and dowry (which the human capital approach to education, for example, could not, see discussion below). This also has serious policy implications since greater public expenditure on education may then actually exacerbate dowry inflation instead of mitigating the problem, as expected according to the human capital approach. Before we explain the mechanism of the model, we first briefly describe the concepts of 'arranged' marriage, education and dowry, especially in the context of our model.There are broadly two main types of marriage arrangements - marriages that dominate Western nations such as the United States and those in Europe and marriages which are dominant in many parts of Asia and Africa (see Penn, 2011 for example). In the former, partners are chosen by each other and relationships are sustained with notions of romantic love culminating in marriage. An arranged marriage on the other hand, is one where parents (rather than prospective spouses themselves) choose marital partners. Arranged marriages so defined remain typical for large parts of the world like India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh (see Myers et al., 2005).By the very nature of the procedure, information transmitted between the marital parties about each other is necessarily limited in an arranged marriage setting, relative to love matches where the potential spouses get to mix freely with each other.1 Narayan (1993) aptly speaks of arranged marriages as follows:2More and more, parents entrust the lives and safety of their daughters to families they know very little about; they can gain no information or assurance from common acquaintances, and they will not be close by to look out for their daughters ' welfare. Parents experience the marriage of their daughter as losing her to another family....In the Western world, usually men and women can mix freely and date each other before selecting their partners (for instance, see Penn, 2011 for an account in Western Europe). In fact, they can even live together before marrying their partners. Hence information regarding each other is likely to be much more accurate than in many societies where such free mixing is eschewed.3 In contrast to such liberal practices as in the West, stringent social norms in many other parts of the world, allow only 'arranged' marriages where families of the potential bride and the groom meet each other and the marriage.4 Naturally the amount of information that can be gathered about the potential bride/groom is substantially small compared to when couples can meet each other.5Moreover, social pressure is such that marriages are hard to break (see Pothen, 1989 for example). Hence once married the couple is expected to stay together irrespective of how the match turns out to be.6 Hence a spouse, once chosen, remains a life-long partner.7 With virilocality, this means the bride/bridal family makes a decision with quite limited information that is going to affect her for the rest of her life (it affects the groom as well but since the bride goes to live with her in-laws she is likely to be more concerned with the decision). …

Patriarchal Investments: Marriage, Dowry and the Political Economy of Development in Bangladesh

ABSTRACTThis article explores why dowry inflation persists in Bangladesh, despite the country being widely heralded as a development success, especially with regard to gender. The article asks three questions. Does rural Bangladesh show changing patterns of marriage similar to those reported elsewhere in South Asia and more broadly? What might explain the persistent spread and inflation of dowry payments? How might changes in marriage and the inflation of dowry be related to the broader political economy of development in Bangladesh? Analysis of primary data from rural Bangladesh affirms shifts in norms of marriage arrangement and conjugal relationships, but also emphasises considerable continuity. The political economy of development in Bangladesh is briefly described. Dowry is argued to function not as compensation for perceived weakness in women’s economic contribution, but to bolster men’s. In mobilising “additional” resources, dowries help sustain the economic system and indicate ongoing commitment to cultural idioms of masculine provision and protection, against a background of widespread corruption and political and gender violence.

Trade Liberalization in a Traditional Society: Implications for Relative Female Survival

Summary Trade openness has ambiguous implications for son preference in a traditional society. While it can work in favor of girls by improving relative female wages or average household income, it can worsen the relative preference for girls by changing marriage payments. This paper exploits an exogenous policy shock in India to study the impact of trade openness on son preference, as reflected in the sex-ratio. Survival chances of girls worsened in regions experiencing high trade openness, particularly for Hindus belonging to traditionally higher castes. I argue that Dowry inflation is a possible channel through which trade liberalization affected sex-ratio.

Is There Dowry Inflation in South Asia?

. This article is the first systematic attempt to measure the existence and degree of dowry inflation in South Asia. The popular press and scholarly literature have assumed dowry inflation in South Asia for some time, and there are now a number of theoretical papers that have attempted to explain the rise of dowries in South Asia. Despite these advances, there has been no systematic study of dowry inflation. Using large-sample retrospective survey data from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nepal, researchers assess the empirical evidence for dowry inflation. They find no evidence that real dowry amounts have systematically increased over time in South Asia.

Impact of Industrialization on Relative Female Survival: Evidence from Trade Policies

This paper exploits an exogenous shift in the trade policy in India to study the impact of industrialization on son preference. Using a difference-in-differences strategy, we find that households are more likely to have a male child in regions with higher trade openness relative to regions with lower trade openness. Moreover, higher trade openness seems to have affected only the Hindu households; there is no analogous effect on the Muslim households. We further analyze the underlying mechanisms through which industrialization might have affected relative survival of daughters. We find a significant increase in real dowry payments in regions experiencing greater trade openness. Most interestingly, dowry inflation is experienced by the Hindu households, but not by the Muslim households. The results are robust to falsification tests using cohorts born much before the liberalization period and are not driven by systematic migration into areas with greater trade openness.

Modernization, inter-caste marriage, and dowry: An analytical perspective

As economic growth and development occurs in India, it has been thought that dowry would decline as an institution. However, the practice of dowry has rapidly spread to regions in India where previously it was not extensively practiced and dowry inflation may be occurring. In this paper, a simple analytical model of dowry, based upon caste determined status differentials, is developed. The model assumes that some inter-caste marriage occurs. The implications of the model are that gross dowry inflation is fueled by economic growth, but net dowry remains unchanged. More importantly, unequal growth stimulates an expansion of the practice of dowry to lower castes.

The Price of Marriage: Net vs. Gross Flows and the South Asian Dowry Debate

The rise in dowry payments in India has been taken as evidence that women increasingly are at a disadvantage on the marriage market and must pay for marriage. Moreover, high dowries, it is argued, add to the plight of parents of daughters and have thus contributed to the scarcity of women (brides). However, the logic is curious, and, this paper argues, flawed. The term “dowry” can mean different things, and it may be useful to distinguish between the assets the bride brings at the time of marriage (gross dowry) and those netted against the groom payments (net dowry). The former is what is generally meant by dowry, while the latter is a concept used mainly by economists. I show that there is no evidence of an increase in real net dowries post 1950 in the ICRISAT data set—a data set that has featured prominently in the literature. I take this to suggest that the widespread reports of dowry inflation refer to an increase in gross dowry, a development which may merely reflect greater parental affluence. (JEL: J12, J16)

Why The Marriage Squeeze Cannot Cause Dowry Inflation

It has been argued that rising dowry payments are caused by population growth. According to that explanation, termed the squeeze, a population increase leads to an excess supply of brides since men marry younger women. As a result, dowry payments rise in order to clear the marriage market. The explanation is essentially static; unmarried brides do not re-enter the marriage market. This paper demonstrates that the marriage squeeze argument cannot explain dowry inflation in a proper dynamic framework. In fact, when women, who do not find matches at the desirable marrying age, re-enter the marriage market as older brides, (as is the case in areas undergoing dowry inflation), the marriage squeeze argument is shown to imply dowry deflation.

Why the marriage squeeze cannot cause dowry inflation

An influential explanation for rising dowry payments is the “marriage squeeze”. The present paper shows this explanation to be internally inconsistent. The marriage squeeze argument for inflation relies on the fact that population growth leads to an excess supply of brides in the marriage market. This excess supply is resolved by some women postponing marriage, so that the average age of brides increases. In previous studies the argument is stated informally. Here, a matching model of marriage is developed to formally analyze the link between dowry payments and population growth. It is shown that a marriage squeeze cannot yield dowry inflation. In fact, when women who do not find matches at the ‘desirable’ marrying age re-enter the marriage market as older brides, a marriage squeeze is shown to imply dowry deflation. Population change is therefore not a promising explanation for the observed increases in dowry payments.

The Marriage Squeeze Interpretation of Dowry Inflation: A Comment

In a recent paper, Rao (1993) advanced a marriage squeeze explanation to the secular rise in real dowries, so-called dowry inflation, witnessed in India. Arguing that the relevant ages with respect to marriage are 10–19 for women and 20–29 for men, Rao found that the ratio of women to men in those age groups had increased over time. Moreover, this sex ratio was found to have a positive and significant impact on dowry when one controls for differences in traits of brides and grooms. The empirical results presented here suggest that Rao’s findings are not robust. Using the same data, I fail to replicate his main result, that is, that the sex ratio (women 10–19/men 20–29) has a positive impact on dowries. Moreover, Rao’s specification—regressing dowries on differences in spouses’ traits (bride’s minus groom’s)—imposes the restriction that attributes influence dowries in a symmetrical fashion, ignoring compelling evidence against that assumption. I find that regressing dowry on individual traits instead of differences improves the model fit considerably.

The Marriage Squeeze Interpretation of Dowry Inflation: Response

Previous articleNext article No AccessCommentsThe Marriage Squeeze Interpretation of Dowry Inflation: ResponseVijayendra RaoVijayendra RaoWorld Bank Search for more articles by this author World BankPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Journal of Political Economy Volume 108, Number 6December 2000 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/317689 Views: 84Total views on this site Citations: 16Citations are reported from Crossref © 2000 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Garima Rastogi, Anisha Sharma Unwanted daughters: the unintended consequences of a ban on sex-selective abortions on the educational attainment of women, Journal of Population Economics 35, no.44 (Apr 2022): 1473–1516.https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-022-00896-zJane Lankes, Mary K. Shenk, Mary C. Towner, Nurul Alam Dowry Inflation: Perception or Reality?, Population Research and Policy Review 125 (Mar 2022).https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-022-09705-7Rossella Calvi, Ajinkya Keskar Dowries, resource allocation, and poverty, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 192 (Dec 2021): 268–303.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2021.10.008Marco Alfano Daughters, dowries, deliveries: The effect of marital payments on fertility choices in India, Journal of Development Economics 125 (Mar 2017): 89–104.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2016.11.004Sofia Amaral, Sonia Bhalotra Population Sex Ratios and Violence Against Women: The Long-Run Effects of Sex Selection in India, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2017).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3055794Raj Arunachalam, Trevon D. Logan On the heterogeneity of dowry motives, Journal of Population Economics 29, no.11 (Feb 2015): 135–166.https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-015-0544-1Trevon D. Logan, Raj Arunachalam Is There Dowry Inflation in South Asia?, Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History 47, no.22 (Apr 2014): 81–94.https://doi.org/10.1080/01615440.2014.880642Priya R. Banerjee Dowry in 21st-Century India, Trauma, Violence, & Abuse 15, no.11 (Jan 2014): 34–40.https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838013496334Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan, John Knodel TRADITION AND CHANGE IN MARRIAGE PAYMENTS IN VIETNAM, 1963–2000, Asian Population Studies 8, no.22 (Apr 2012): 151–172.https://doi.org/10.1080/17441730.2012.675677Andrew M. Francis Sex ratios and the red dragon: using the Chinese Communist Revolution to explore the effect of the sex ratio on women and children in Taiwan, Journal of Population Economics 24, no.33 (Jul 2009): 813–837.https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-009-0262-7Peter Davis Social Exclusion and Adverse Incorporation in Rural Bangladesh: Evidence from a Mixed - Methods Study of Poverty Dynamics, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2011).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1896135Hannah Paul ‘The Progression Towards Gender Equality in India is Dependant Upon Economic Modernisation’, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2008).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2136450Marcel Fafchamps, Agnes R. Quisumbing Chapter 51 Household Formation and Marriage Markets in Rural Areas, (Jan 2007): 3187–3247.https://doi.org/10.1016/S1573-4471(07)04051-XSonia Dalmia A hedonic analysis of marriage transactions in India: estimating determinants of dowries and demand for groom characteristics in marriage, Research in Economics 58, no.33 (Sep 2004): 235–255.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rie.2004.03.002Maristella Botticini, Aloysius Siow Why Dowries?, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2003).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.380129Indraneel Dasgupta, Diganta Mukherjee 'Arranged' Marriage, Dowry and Female Literacy in a Transitional Society, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2003).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.463580

Medieval and Renaissance Venice

For the first time in a generation, leading scholars of medieval and Renaissance join forces to define the current state of the field. Forays into neglected aspects of Venetian studies reveal new insights into coinage and concubinage, the first Jewish ghetto and the Fourth Crusade, and other matters from dowry inflation to state spectacle to cheese. These essays are emblematic of the dynamism that has marked Venetian scholarship over the past half-century, reflecting a shift in the definition of 'history' and 'historiography' from states, military engagements, and economies to prostitutes, brawlers, peasants, and the poor. Contributors bring to this volume impressive experience and expertise in the use of archival material to explore a rich variety of subject matter, interpretations, and methodologies. They draw on both public and private sources - tourist guides, eyewitness reports, government edicts, police records, diary entries, and literary sources in dialect - to articulate a compelling narrative of cultural change in an age of social discipline. Through topics such as Venice's Hostage Crisis: Diplomatic Efforts to Secure Peace with Byzantium between 1171 and 1184, The Abbot's Concubine, and Curfew Time in the Ghetto of Venice, contributors explore diplomatic, economic, and architectural matters, as well as social and cultural trends. Many take interdisciplinary and intercultural approaches, employing innovative methodologies that take Venetian historiography in new directions. Marked by an interweaving of texts and contexts that represents a microcosm of the kind of discussion that continues to animate the discipline, Medieval and Renaissance Venice demonstrates the ways in which historiography continuously seeks to make the past vitally present.

Dowry's Inflation in Rural India: A Statistical Investigation

Dowry's Inflation in Rural India: A Statistical Investigation

Stratégies matrimoniales et choix d'objet incestueux

Marriage Strategies and the Choice of an Incestuous Object. An analysis of matrimonial strategies in Karpathos focusses attention on the economy of the economic, symbolic and affective exchanges between kin, in particular between the different members of the phratry. Having a dominant position in a disorderly matrimonial market, the men have become more demanding year by year as regards dowries, to such an extent that brothers are forced to contribute to the provision of their sisters'dowries. As is shown by the celebratory poems in praise of those who achieve educational qualifications, composed by members of their families and published in the village newspaper, qualifications are tending to replace the former determinants of social value. Thus girls'schooling makes it possible to escape from the effects of dowry inflation. In a context of sexual repression in which everything, including the position of the sleepers in the domestic space, tends to favour the power of familial bonds, the choice of spouse sometimes takes the form of the choice of an incestuous object. Forename fetishism is the basis of the displacement of incestuous feelings. It would seem that calculation of the variations of the frequency of marriage with someone having the same forename as a member of one's own domestic group may, in some cases, provide the historians of kinship with a useful analytical instrument.