IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/reveho/v5y2007i1p1-13.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On the expansion of the market and the decline of the family

Author

Listed:
  • Joel Guttman
  • Nira Yacouel

Abstract

Over the past two hundred years, large, modern firms have tended to replace small, family businesses. In parallel, the family has declined as a social institution. We suggest that these developments are interrelated. Because information of cheating in market transactions spreads only gradually in large markets, the reputation of the family firm could support contractual performance only in small, traditional markets. As markets grew in size, this reputational mechanism could no longer operate. The small, family firm was then replaced by the large, modern firm. This transition led to a decrease in the importance of the family. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007

Suggested Citation

  • Joel Guttman & Nira Yacouel, 2007. "On the expansion of the market and the decline of the family," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 1-13, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:reveho:v:5:y:2007:i:1:p:1-13
    DOI: 10.1007/s11150-007-9003-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11150-007-9003-4
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11150-007-9003-4?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gary S. Becker, 1981. "A Treatise on the Family," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number beck81-1, February.
    2. Katz, Eliakim & Rosenberg, Jacob, 2005. "An economic interpretation of institutional volunteering," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 429-443, June.
    3. Becker, Gary S, 1993. "Nobel Lecture: The Economic Way of Looking at Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(3), pages 385-409, June.
    4. Bisin, Alberto & Verdier, Thierry, 1998. "On the cultural transmission of preferences for social status," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 75-97, October.
    5. Joel M. Guttman, 2003. "Repeated interaction and the evolution of preferences for reciprocity," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(489), pages 631-656, July.
    6. Caplan, Bryan, 2003. "Stigler-Becker versus Myers-Briggs: why preference-based explanations are scientifically meaningful and empirically important," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 391-405, April.
    7. Smith, James P & Ward, Michael P, 1985. "Time-Series Growth in the Female Labor Force," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(1), pages 59-90, January.
    8. Akerlof, George A, 1983. "Loyalty Filters," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 73(1), pages 54-63, March.
    9. Joel M. Guttman & Shmuel Nitzan & Uriel Spiegel, 1992. "Rent Seeking And Social Investment In Taste Change," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(1), pages 31-42, March.
    10. Bernstein, Lisa, 1992. "Opting Out of the Legal System: Extralegal Contractual Relations in the Diamond Industry," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 21(1), pages 115-157, January.
    11. Guttman, Joel M., 2001. "Self-enforcing reciprocity norms and intergenerational transfers: theory and evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 117-151, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/20g3idj0jd9iqosvjjdcbu44lu is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Alberto Alesina & Yann Algan & Pierre Cahuc & Paola Giuliano, 2015. "Family Values And The Regulation Of Labor," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 599-630, August.
    3. Fishman, Arthur & Finkelstein, Israel & Simhon, Avi & Yacouel, Nira, 2018. "Collective brands," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 316-339.
    4. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/20g3idj0jd9iqosvjjdcbu44lu is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Alberto Alesina & Yann Algan & Pierre Cahuc & Paola Giuliano, 2015. "Family Values And The Regulation Of Labor," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 599-630, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Guttman, Joel M. & Goette, Lorenz, 2015. "Reputation, volunteering, and trust: Minimizing reliance on taste-based explanations," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PB), pages 375-386.
    2. Wolff, Francois-Charles & Laferrere, Anne, 2006. "Microeconomic models of family transfers," Handbook on the Economics of Giving, Reciprocity and Altruism, in: S. Kolm & Jean Mercier Ythier (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Giving, Altruism and Reciprocity, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 13, pages 889-969, Elsevier.
    3. Alberto Bisin & Giorgio Topa & Thierry Verdier, 2004. "Cooperation as a Transmitted Cultural Trait," Rationality and Society, , vol. 16(4), pages 477-507, November.
    4. Joel M. Guttman, 2010. "Urbanization, Old-Age Security, Saving and Fertility in Developing Economies," NFI Working Papers 2010-WP-07, Indiana State University, Scott College of Business, Networks Financial Institute.
    5. Barnet-Verzat, Christine & Wolff, Francois-Charles, 2002. "Motives for pocket money allowance and family incentives," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 339-366, June.
    6. Jellal, Mohamed & Wolff, Francois-Charles, 2002. "Cultural evolutionary altruism: theory and evidence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 241-262, June.
    7. Guttman, Joel M., 2001. "Self-enforcing reciprocity norms and intergenerational transfers: theory and evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 117-151, July.
    8. Cheal, David & Kampen, Karen, 1997. "Complementarity in the labor supply of husbands and wives," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 26(5), pages 495-512.
    9. Mengel, Friederike, 2008. "Matching structure and the cultural transmission of social norms," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 67(3-4), pages 608-623, September.
    10. Carlos Brambila-Paz, 2017. "Households, Families and Prospective Economic Mobility in Mexico," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 38(4), pages 582-595, December.
    11. Ina GANGULI & Ricardo HAUSMANN & Martina VIARENGO, 2014. "Closing the gender gap in education: What is the state of gaps in labour force participation for women, wives and mothers?," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 153(2), pages 173-207, June.
    12. Frans van Winden, 2000. "Group Formation in a Public Good Experiment. On The Dynamics of Social Ties Structures," CESifo Working Paper Series 332, CESifo.
    13. Cigno, A., 2016. "Conflict and Cooperation Within the Family, and Between the State and the Family, in the Provision of Old-Age Security," Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, in: Piggott, John & Woodland, Alan (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 609-660, Elsevier.
    14. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Jeremy Greenwood & Nezih Guner, 2011. "From Shame to Game in One Hundred Years: A Macroeconomic Model of the Rise in Premarital Sex and its De-Stigmatization," RCER Working Papers 569, University of Rochester - Center for Economic Research (RCER).
    15. Guiso, Luigi & Zaccaria, Luana, 2023. "From patriarchy to partnership: Gender equality and household finance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(3), pages 573-595.
    16. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde & Jeremy Greenwood & Nezih Guner, 2014. "From Shame To Game In One Hundred Years: An Economic Model Of The Rise In Premarital Sex And Its De-Stigmatization," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 12(1), pages 25-61, February.
    17. Guttman, Joel M., 2013. "On the evolution of conditional cooperation," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 15-34.
    18. Joep H. Sonnemans & Frans van Dijk & Frans A.A.M. van Winden, 1999. "Group Formation in a Public Good Experiment," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 99-093/1, Tinbergen Institute.
    19. Joel M. Guttman, 2010. "Reputation, Trust and the Logic of Group Lending," NFI Working Papers 2010-WP-02, Indiana State University, Scott College of Business, Networks Financial Institute.
    20. Alberto Bisin & Thierry Verdier, 2010. "The Economics of Cultural Transmission and Socialization," Post-Print halshs-00754788, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Reputation; Family; Theory of the firm; J12; L14; L25;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation
    • L25 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Performance

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:reveho:v:5:y:2007:i:1:p:1-13. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.