Data and Code for: Can Policy Change Culture? Government Pension Plans and Traditional Kinship Practices

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Natalie Bau, UCLA

Version:  View help for Version V1

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  GIS files 01/11/2021 03:14:PM
  ado 01/11/2021 03:15:PM
  analysis_do 01/11/2021 03:14:PM
  created_data 01/11/2021 03:14:PM
  figures 01/11/2021 03:15:PM
  logfiles 01/11/2021 03:15:PM
  make_data_do 02/11/2021 06:22:PM
  raw_data 02/22/2021 06:08:PM
  tables 01/11/2021 03:28:PM
README.pdf application/pdf 375.9 KB 02/22/2021 01:05:PM

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary
Policies may change the incentives that allow cultural practices to persist. To test this, I study matrilocality and patrilocality, kinship traditions that determine daughters’ and sons’ post-marriage residences and thus, which gender lives with and supports parents in their old age. Two separate policy experiments in Ghana and Indonesia show that pension policies reduce the practice of these traditions. I also show that these traditions incentivize parents to invest in the education of children who traditionally co-reside with them. Consequently, when pension plans change cultural practices, they also reduce educational investment. This finding further demonstrates that policy can change culture.
Keywords: cultural transmission, cultural change, kinship traditions, intergenerational transfers.



Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms public survey data; census data; ipums; ifls
JEL Classification:  View help for JEL Classification
      H52 National Government Expenditures and Education
      I00 Health, Education, and Welfare: General
      J14 Economics of the Elderly; Economics of the Handicapped; Non-labor Market Discrimination
      O12 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage Indonesia, Ghana
Universe:  View help for Universe Census data constitute random samples of all individuals in Indonesia and Ghana in the census years.
Data Type(s):  View help for Data Type(s) census/enumeration data; geographic information system (GIS) data; survey data

Methodology

Data Source:  View help for Data Source Indonesia Family Life Survey
Statistics Indonesia: 1971 census, 1980 census, 1990 census, 1995 intercensus, 2010 census
Ghana Statistical Services: 2000 census
IPUMS (Minnesota Population Center)
Ethnographic Atlas
Perusahan Umum Asuransi Sosial Tenaga Kerja (1985) 
Unit(s) of Observation:  View help for Unit(s) of Observation ethnic groups, districts, individuals

Related Publications

Download this project

Published Versions

V1 [2021-05-24]

Export Metadata

Dublin Core

DDI 2.5

Report a Problem

Found a serious problem with the data, such as disclosure risk or copyrighted content? Let us know.

This material is distributed exactly as it arrived from the data depositor. ICPSR has not checked or processed this material. Users should consult the investigator(s) if further information is desired.