The most significant obstacle to conducting empirical training towards the dowry is the run out of otherwise inadequacy of information

2.2 Issues with existing analysis

While the dowry is legitimately banned inside the Asia and you may Bangladesh, someone always think twice to tell you appropriate dowry numbers. The quality concern towards dowry regarding the Indian dataset asks in the community-built dowry. Eg, the fresh India Human Creativity Survey asks “Essentially in the area to possess a family group such as your personal, exactly what are the brand of items that are provided while the presents during the time of the newest daughter’s matrimony?” A community-based dowry is not the just like a single dowry, that’s paid off because of the bride’s moms and dads in the course of marriage. Rather, practical question out-of dowry https://brightwomen.net/tr/meksikali-kadinlar/ allows simply a binary respond to, we.age., no matter if a confident level of dowry is reduced (elizabeth.g., Questionnaire on the Position of females and Fertility both in India and you will Pakistan). A binary respond to, needless to say, doesn’t provide much facts. Typical out-of whether an optimistic dowry count is provided matches so you’re able to, and that’s mainly explained because of the, ethnic, spiritual, and status experiences when you look at the Southern area China.

Because the dowry isn’t legally banned when you look at the Pakistan, extent myself paid back of the female respondent’s parents are going to be asked without scheduling within the a Pakistani dataset such as the Pakistan Rural Home Survey. Although Pakistani interviewees might not purposefully hide real information regarding dowry means, the brand new survey get however have recall problems as participants have to keep in mind the newest dowry number paid off of the their moms and dads previously. Shape 1a plots brand new predicted amount of actual dowry viewpoints measured during the Pakistani Rupees into the 2004 to marriage year having fun with investigation away from the fresh Pakistan Outlying House Survey. Once the consensus would be the fact genuine dowry numbers is actually broadening, or perhaps showcase a non-declining development, the fresh new profile means all round interest away from recall errors. Simply put, the new lengthened the brand new gap involving the interviewees’ marriage additionally the remember date, a lot more likely they are in order to overestimate this new dowry amount.

Matchmaking ranging from ladies’ ounts. The fresh range shows the new predict genuine level of dowry regressed to your ladies’ relationship 12 months. The newest shady urban area suggests 95% believe period of forecast quantity of dowry. The data resources of (a) and you can (b) is Pakistan Outlying Domestic Survey 2004, and outlying domestic questionnaire used because of the copywriter in the 2013, correspondingly

step three Study

With the best of our very own knowledge, data obtained within this studies could be the basic to take on explicitly a general tendency to overestimate a price paid down extended in the past. Much like the attributes from previously gathered studies, ours are also retrospective; not, based on that it inclination, we such as for example adopted certain operate to minimize survey remember problems. Eg, we required the level of one another society-situated dowry (non-retrospective) and personal dowry matter paid back during the fresh respondent’s marriage (retrospective). As Pakistani dowry includes gold/jewelry, dresses, furniture, cooking utensils, and the like, i queried dowry quantity because of the goods. When we considered a respondent’s overestimation of your own dowry amount, particularly in happening regarding a wedding one to happened a beneficial while before, since dowry is showed, we can and you may did check these quantity that have people that attended the new service. Therefore, all of our data on the forecast actual degrees of dowry (Fig. 1b) do not tell you people decreasing development, having said that which have those said when you look at the Fig. 1a.

step 3.1 Questionnaire

When conducting our survey between , we intended to capture the heterogeneous aspects of the Punjab province in Pakistan. We divided Punjab (36 districts) into five regions: Pothohar (or North), Central, East, West, and South Punjab. Climate, culture (including marriage/inheritance practices), and socioeconomic conditions differ across regions but are similar within each region. We randomly selected one district from each region, namely, Rawalpindi, Mandi Bahauddin, Narowal, Muzaffargarh, and Bahawalnagar (Fig. 2). We used the district census for 1998–1999, the latest census available in Pakistan as of 2013, to randomly select six villages in rural areas in each of the five districts. We restricted sampling villages to those with a population of at least 1000 at the time of the census. In each village, we selected 22 households, following a stratified random sampling methodology. First, with assistance from the village chief, we made a list of households in the village and categorized them into a stratum. The strata are kammees Footnote 10 (i.e., traditional service or lower caste, with annual income ? PKR 200,000, > PKR 200,000) and zamindars (i.e., landowning farmers with land < 5,>12.5 acres). Eligible households in our survey are defined as those with an economically active husband and wife aged 15–65. Second, we performed stratified random sampling so that the share of each stratum in our sample corresponds to the share of each stratum of the village population (= households).