The traditional expectation that married women should be homemakers restricts them from pursuing their comparative advantage in the labor market. I quantify the aggregate economic consequences of these marriage-specific gender norms, accounting for selection into marriage and labor force participation. In 1940, married women faced a "norms wedge" equivalent to a 44% tax on market wages compared to similar single women, which fell to 14% by 2010. Had these norms persisted at 1940 levels, market output today would be 8.7% lower and combined market and home output 5.3% lower. Amplification effects through endogenous human capital investment and marriage decisions, which reshape the productivity distribution of both women and men, are critical to generating these large results.

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20 August 2025     Paper Number CEPDP2119

Download PDF - Marriage and misallocation: evidence from 70 years of US history

This CEP discussion paper is published under the centre's Labour programme.

This publication comes under the following theme: Gender in the labour market