Social Norms Research Paper

Myriad strategic decisions by parents to socialize their daughters for the marriage market rather than for the labor market in light of an economic system for which marketable female labor is not as productive as male’s. Most of these decisions were undoubtedly not strategic at all, at least in the sense of conscious efforts to maximize utility. Rules of thumb that work for one generation get passed along to subsequent ones, and as long as they work, tend to become enshrined in moral and religious teachings. Social norms about gender roles enabled people to economize on information about choices over education, marriage, and work, and to help them avoid making potentially costly errors.The power of norms to outlive the economic circumstances from which

Moral and religious education added to the tensile strength of social normsby attaching cosmic significance to what otherwise might have been simple economic choices. Although efficiency is a tough competitor to beat in the very long run, moralizers and other incumbents have been able to manipulate social norms for an effective eternity for any given generation of women.Female bargaining power, measured in our empirical investigation by the proportion of household work they do over and above what is predicted by labor market participation alone, is stronger in countries with fluid labor markets, and where public sector employment is large enough to offset the negative effects of long term contracts on female employment in the private sector. Where barriers to divorce cut off a possible marital exit, demand for female labor has a muted effect on female bargaining power.But female bargaining power in the family does not always have the effect, as one might expect, of also boosting female political