Disagreement in Partners' Reports of Financial Difficulty

38 Pages Posted: 7 Jun 2005

See all articles by Robert V. Breunig

Robert V. Breunig

Australian National University (ANU) - Crawford School of Public Policy; Tax and Transfer Policy Institute (Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU); IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Deborah A. Cobb-Clark

School of Economics, University of Sydney; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Xiaodong Gong

Australian National University (ANU) - School of Economics; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Daniella Venn

Government of the Commonwealth of Australia - Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR)

Date Written: June 2005

Abstract

We use unique data in which both partners report about household finances to demonstrate that there is often disagreement about whether the household has experienced financial difficulty in the past year. Four alternative explanations for this disagreement are tested using the data. The results indicate that disagreement may be related to the severity of the underlying material hardship rather than to gender differences, information asymmetries, or individual (as opposed to household) views of financial difficulty. This implies that standard surveys which collect information about the household's financial position from a representative individual may fail to completely characterize the nature of material hardship.

Keywords: Household finances, survey methodology, material hardship

JEL Classification: C42, D14, I31

Suggested Citation

Breunig, Robert V. and Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. and Gong, Xiaodong and Venn, Daniella, Disagreement in Partners' Reports of Financial Difficulty (June 2005). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=738263 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.738263

Robert V. Breunig

Australian National University (ANU) - Crawford School of Public Policy ( email )

7 Liversidge Street
Lennox Crossing
Canberra, ACT 0200
Australia
61261252148 (Phone)

HOME PAGE: http://https://crawford.anu.edu.au/crawford_people/content/staff/rbreunig.php

Tax and Transfer Policy Institute (Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU) ( email )

Canberra
Australia

IZA Institute of Labor Economics ( email )

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Deborah A. Cobb-Clark (Contact Author)

School of Economics, University of Sydney ( email )

606 Social Sciences Bldg. (A02)
The University of Sydney
Sydney, NSW 2006
Australia
61435061387 (Phone)

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Xiaodong Gong

Australian National University (ANU) - School of Economics ( email )

Coombs Building 9
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 0200
Australia
61 2 6125 4235 (Phone)
61 2 6125 0182 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://econrsss.anu.edu.au/Staff/gong/contact_xg.htm

IZA Institute of Labor Economics ( email )

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany
049 228/ 3894 527 (Phone)
049 228/ 3894 510 (Fax)

Daniella Venn

Government of the Commonwealth of Australia - Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR)

Level 6, Times Square
16 Mort Street
Canberra, ACT 2601
Australia

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