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Cultural roots of family ties

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 June 2020

Lewis S. Davis  and
Claudia R. Williamson
Lewis S. Davis
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, Union College, Schenectady, NY, USA
Claudia R. Williamson*
Affiliation:
Department of Finance and Economics, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: claudia.williamson@msstate.edu
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Abstract

We forward the hypothesis and empirically establish that variations in the strength of family ties are rooted in culture. In particular, we show that individualism is associated with looser family ties. We exploit the associations between contemporary individualism and historical climatic and disease environments to establish a causal relationship. At both the individual- and country-levels, we find strong support that individualism reduces family ties. The estimated effects are economically large and robust to a wide variety of potentially confounding variables.

Keywords

Collectivismculturefamily tiesindividualisminstitutions

JEL classification

O5: Economywide Country Studies Z1: Cultural Economics • Economic Sociology • Economic Anthropology J2: Demand and Supply of Labor D1: Household Behavior and Family Economics J16: Economics of Gender • Non-labor Discrimination
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Institutional Economics , Volume 16 , Issue 6 , December 2020 , pp. 785 - 808
Copyright
Copyright © Millennium Economics Ltd 2020

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