A growing family: An updated view of children and pets in wealthy households
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This analysis focuses on the question of how children and pets are viewed by members of various education and income groups, with a particular emphasis on the top of the education and income distribution. I update previous analyses of the putative tradeoff between children and pets by employing recent 2000-2022 Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES) interview data to determine, stratified by income and education, how household pets may be seen as an alternative economic choice to children. The results show pets increasingly treated like offspring in terms of spending, and perhaps even substituting for and/or serving as complements to children, based on family income and educational attainment. This analysis substantially extends the existing literature by establishing the important implications of pets regarding the future structure of household utility functions.
Abstract
This analysis focuses on the question of how children and pets are viewed by members of various education and income groups, with a particular emphasis on the top of the education and income distribution. I update previous analyses of the putative tradeoff between children and pets by employing recent 2000-2022 Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES) interview data to determine, stratified by income and education, how household pets may be seen as an alternative economic choice to children. The results show pets increasingly treated like offspring in terms of spending, and perhaps even substituting for and/or serving as complements to children, based on family income and educational attainment. This analysis substantially extends the existing literature by establishing the important implications of pets regarding the future structure of household utility functions.