为结婚而买房:城市房产与婚姻缔结

Buying a House for Marriage:Homeownership and Household Formation in Urban China

大量文献表明,住房自有产权可以给个体和家庭带来诸多好处,拥有住房在理论上会提高个体在婚姻市场上的竞争力。中国城市的住房价格在房改之后不断攀升,且住房与公共教育等社会资源紧密关联,因此住房对婚姻的影响在中国城市可能更加明显。本文利用中国家庭追踪调查(CFPS)数据,通过比较中国城市的住房所有者和租户的结婚概率来验证这一假设。基准结果表明,住房所有者比租户的结婚概率要高6.3个百分点,城市房产对婚姻缔结确实起到了一定的促进作用。此外,本文还发现,住房财富的增加进一步强化了房产对婚姻的正向影响。

Due to many benefits brought by homeownership,which have been highlighted in existing research,owning a house may increase one’s attractiveness in the marriage market.Since housing price in urban China has been rising since the housing reform,and housing is closely associated with social resources such as public education,the impact of housing assets on marriage may be therefore more pronounced in Chinese cities.We test this hypothesis by comparing the marriage rate between homeowners and renters in urban China.Using data from the China Family Panel Studies(CFPS)survey,we find that,after controlling for observables,homeownership increases the likelihood of marriage by almost 6.3 percentage points.We also find that the increase in housing wealth enhances the positive effect of homeownership on marriage.