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Author: Johnson, Shirley B.
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Johnson, Shirley B.
Impact of Women's Liberation on Marriage, Divorce, and Family Life Style
In: Sex, Discrimination, and the Division of Labor. CB Lloyd, ed. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1975
Cohort(s): Mature Women
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Keyword(s): Discrimination, Sex; Divorce; Dual-Career Families; Family Income; Family Structure; Housework/Housewives; Husbands; Marriage; Military Personnel; Research Methodology

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

The "Women's Liberation Effect" is defined as a change in the preference functions of women in the face of more activities outside the household. This paper utilizes an economic analysis to study the effects of the attitudinal change in women on household production functions, preference functions of spouses, and patterns of marriage, divorce, and household formation. In a final section, some feminist proposals for further changes in marriage and the married household are critically evaluated, using the economic model of marriage as a framework of analysis. The women's liberation effect appears to have lowered the economic returns to marriage, at least temporarily. The present demographic situation in the United States, characterized by a decline in the income elasticity of the marriage rate, a rise in the age at marriage, and a high rate of divorce, can be interpreted as reflecting a "disequilibrium" due to changing tastes as well as changing relative productivities of men and women within the context of the traditional marriage. In the long run, however, it is possible that changes in the preference functions of both men and women as well as changes in household production functions will fundamentally alter the way in which the cost and returns from marriage are evaluated.
Bibliography Citation
Johnson, Shirley B. "Impact of Women's Liberation on Marriage, Divorce, and Family Life Style" In: Sex, Discrimination, and the Division of Labor. CB Lloyd, ed. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1975