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Gender, Agricultural Production, and the Theory of the Household

Christopher Udry

Northwestern University

Journal of Political Economy 1996

Virtually all models of the household assume that the allocation of resources is Pareto efficient. Within many African households, agricultural production occurs on many plots controlled by different members of the household. Pareto efficiency implies that factors should be allocated efficiently across these plots. The author finds, in contrast, that plots controlled by women are farmed much less intensively than similar plots within the household controlled by men. The estimates imply that about 6 percent of output is lost because of inefficient factor allocation within the household. The paper suggests a new approach to modeling intrahousehold allocation consistent with the empirical results. Copyright 1996 by University of Chicago Press.

DOI
10.1086/262050
Volume
104 (5)
Pages
1010-1046
Language
en
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