The allocation of expenditures within the household: a new survey

We report on a data initiative that is designed to address the question of 'who gets what' within the household. The data consist of supplements to the Danish Household Expenditure Survey (DHES), which is a traditional nationally representative diary-based survey of expenditures. We collect supplementary data of two kinds for all couples (with or without children) in the survey. The first set of additional information is that respondents report on the intra-household allocation of each item of expenditure recorded in the diary. The allowed assignments are 'the whole family', 'the wife', 'the husband', 'the children', 'others' and 'not assignable'. The second addition is an extra set of 'sociological' questions concerning household financial management, autonomy and family background.

We focus on the survey design and give some descriptive statistics from the survey. We also show how the distribution of expenditure on clothing, which is often used to look at intra-household allocation, is related to the distribution of expenditure on other goods.

The paper concludes that it is feasible to collect information on 'who gets what' within the household and that some sociological questions provide valuable supplementary information for some issues of interest.