1、Leaving home: independence, togetherness and income in Europe,Maria Iacovou,Series of transitions: Finishing school Getting a job Leaving home Partnering Having children Sequencing, and transitions themselves, not universal. Argument for expanding definition of youth upwards,The transition to adulth
2、ood,2,3,Motivation,4,Trend towards later home-leaving in OECD countries Conceptualised as being caused by adverse events Unemployment, insecure employment, low incomes, etc And as having adverse consequences Lack of independence for offspring (and parents) Financial consequences for parents Neither
3、of these is necessarily true,All analysis (some from previous publications, some new) from large-scale cross-national data sets European Community Household Panel (ECHP) 1996 2002: EU-15 European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) 2004 onwards: EU-27,Data,5,6,“North/Western”
4、cluster: UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland,7,“Nordic” cluster: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway,“North/Western” cluster: UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland,8,“Nordic” cluster: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway,“North/Western”
5、cluster: UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland,“Southern” cluster: Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, (Malta),9,“Nordic” cluster: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway,“North/Western” cluster: UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland,“
6、Southern” cluster: Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, (Malta),“Eastern” cluster: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech R, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria,10,“Nordic” cluster: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Netherlands,“North/Western” cluster: UK, France, Germany, Austria,
7、Belgium, Luxembourg,“Southern” cluster: Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, (Malta), Ireland,“Eastern” cluster 1: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Czech R, Hungary,“Eastern” cluster 2: Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania, Bulgaria,Incomes lower than (eg) Turkey, Mexico, Chile, Malaysia,Variations in
8、the age at leaving home,11,Source: Adapted from Iacovou and Skew (2010),Leaving home by age: four countries (men),12,Denmark,Bulgaria,Germany,Italy,Source: new analysis of EU-SILC (2007),Denmark: men (top) and women (b0ttom),13,Germany: men (top) and women (b0ttom),14,Italy: men (top) and women (b0t
9、tom),15,Bulgaria: men (top) and women (b0ttom),16,Economic factors income sufficiency, job security Institutional factors eg, welfare state Housing markets supply, price, mortgage markets Social norms Family ties,Why does home-leaving vary so much?,17,Independence = ability to make your own decision
10、s, support yourself financially, spend time alone Togetherness = sense of kinship / belonging Assume everyone values both to some extent Not mutually exclusive, but trade-offs for young adults Reher (1998): “Northern” European model characterised by weak family ties; “Southern” model of “strong” fam
11、ily ties,“Independence” and “togetherness”,18,CANT assume that societies where young adults live with their parents are those with “strong” family ties or a preference for “togetherness” Look at the relationship between income and home-leaving,“Independence” and “togetherness”,19,Higher incomes POSI
12、TIVELY related to earlier home-leaving,Higher incomes NEGATIVELY related to home-leaving,Infer preference for independence,Infer preference for togetherness,Distinguish between parents and childrens incomes Logit regressions separately for each group of countries Sample of young adults aged 18-35 st
13、ill living at home, analyse the determinants of moving out the following year Also control for: Young persons age (and age squared) Economic activity (employed/unemployed/home and family/education) Characteristics of family of origin (two-parent/stepfamily/lone parent) Rooms per person (crowding) Pa
14、rents education & age at marriage Maternal employment,Analytical framework,20,Results,21,Own income positively related to leaving home. Infer preference among young adults for independence strongest in Nordic countries,Parental income ALSO positively related to leaving home in Nordic & Northern coun
15、tries.,But parental income is negatively related to leaving home in Southern countries.,Source: adapted from Iacovou (2011),Distinguishing between destinations,22,Negative effect of parental income now apparent for both sexes in Southern countries,Source: adapted from Iacovou (2011),Does the effect
16、of income vary with age?,23,Answer: yes! The effect of own income does not vary significantly with age The effect of parental income does vary Theory: parents use their incomes to delay home-leaving when offspring are “too young”, and use their incomes to encourage home-leaving when offspring are “o
17、ld enough” (or “too old”). How old is “old enough”? About age 20 in Nordic countries About age 22 in Northern countries About age 27 for women in Southern countries About age 35 for men in Southern countries,And Eastern Europe? Own income.,24,Effect positive everywhere, but much larger in Nordic cou
18、ntries,Adapted from Skew and Iacovou (2011),And Eastern Europe? Parental income,25,Effect negative in Eastern 1 group (Baltic states plus Hungary and Czech Republic),Effect positive in Eastern 2 group (Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland),Returns home,26,Source: Iacovou and Parisi (2009),
19、using data from the European Community Household Panel,Wide variations in age at leaving home Many factors involved in variations within and between countries Norms play a role Preferences for togetherness versus independence play a role Economic constraints evident, particularly across some countri
20、es of Eastern Europe,Conclusions,27,Who supports whom? Poverty, financial strain and intergenerational co-residence,Maria Iacovou and Maria Davia,Young peoples incomes as a % of their households incomes (sample: young people aged 19-34 living with their parents),Reasons for variation,Household size
21、One parent/two parents/other adults/children Employment Youth employment rates Parents employment rates Employment of other adults in household Wages Wages of young adult in relation to parents wages Benefits,Do the level of earnings, as well as having a job, matter?,do we observe this pattern just
22、because of age differences between the young people still living at home?,Both the age distribution AND age-earnings profiles contribute to differences in earnings,Scandinavian countries: many 2-earner parents; low-ish youth employment rate, low youth earnings,Including predicted levels.,North/Weste
23、rn countries: fairly low % with jobs (except AT and NL!), low youth earnings (again, except AT and NL),Including predicted levels.,Low % of 2-worker parents, high % with jobs, fairly high % with only 1 parent.,Including predicted levels.,High employment and relative earnings; high % lone parents,The
24、se figures cover entire income range,Are there differences between rich and poor households? Expect young people in wealthier households to “contribute” a lower % of the households income,Omitted material.,Multivariate analysis of characteristics associated with high % of incomes,YPs role in determi
25、ning poverty status,Calculate household income and poverty status Counterfactual: “remove” young person and all the income associated with their presence in the household Calculate counterfactual poverty status of household Allocate hypothetical benefits to young person and calculate their counterfa
26、ctual poverty status Eight possible sets of outcomes,% of households below 75% median,The issue of sharing,Adult children dont always share their funds with the rest of their households But we can assess the extent to which children contribute to household coffers, as follows: HS120: describe your a
27、bility to make ends meet 6-point scale, from “great difficulty” to “very easily”. Generate a variable indicating year-on-year change Take a sample of households with young adults co-resident with parents in year t Generate variable indicating if young people leave home Multinomial regressions of cha
28、nge in making ends meet Define 3 outcomes: worse same better,What do we expect?,Marginal effects: all countries pooled (sample of households with YP aged 25-25),By country groups:,Next steps,Already: Looked at age of young person: no systematic differences between 25-29s and 30-35s No difference bet
29、ween men and women, once you control for income Control for contemporaneous changes in Income of other family members Household composition YP getting or losing a job but remaining in household Assess the % of YPs income which is “shared” Look (cross-sectionally) at the relationship between YPs inco
30、mes and parents subjective assessments.,Conclusions,Economic support between young people and their families is not all one way Young peoples incomes do contribute, in some meaningful way, to their families sense of financial security The degree of this contribution is strongly related to young peoples incomes and labour market status,
