Abstract
Registered partnership (RP) and marriage in the Netherlands are identical in terms of rights and obligations but may differ in symbolism. Exploiting same-sex marriage legalization (SSML) in the Netherlands as a policy shock, we investigate the effect of marital symbolism on partnership stability. Applying a mixed competing risks model to administrative micro-data, we disentangle selectivity into marriage from the effect of getting married. Our main finding is that partnerships that transformed into marriage had a substantially lower separation rate. We take this result as evidence of the symbolic effect of marriage stabilizing partnerships. We discuss economic mechanisms of marital symbolism related to marriage premiums.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 44-58 |
| Journal | Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization |
| Volume | 178 |
| Early online date | 2 Aug 2020 |
| Publication status | Published - Oct 2020 |
Keywords
- Same-sex marriage
- Registered partnership
- Separation
- Duration analysis