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The purpose of this study was to examine family structure differences in debt types and burdens of American families.

Data was from the 2016 Survey of Consumer Finances. Eight types of family structures, five specific debts, and two debt burden indicators are examined with multivariate logistic regressions.

After controlling for several socioeconomic variables, multivariate logistic regression results show that married with children families are more likely than five other family types to have any debt. In terms of specific debt, married with children families are more likely than six other types of families to have mortgages, four other types to have credit card loans, five other types to have to vehicle loans, three other types to have education loans, and one other type to have purchase loans. Married with children families are more likely than three other types of families (childless married couples, single males, and single females) to be late in debt payment for 60 or more days.

The data is limited to one-year cross-sectional data. To gain more insights on this topic, panel data could be used.

The findings can be used for financial service professionals to identify loan demand and risk associated with various family structures and develop effective marketing strategies to serve these clients.

The findings are informative for public policymakers to develop family friendly economic policies and for consumer educators who help consumers make effective financial decisions when borrowing various types of loans.

First, this study uses an innovative definition of family structure that counts several nontraditional family structures. Second, this study examines family structure differences in holdings of five specific debts together.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of family structure on child labor by comparing children of nuclear families headed by the father with children of single-mother families headed by the divorced mother.

This paper uses data from Brazilian urban areas provided by the Brazilian Demographic Census of 2010. The empirical approach consists of the estimation of three treatment effect models: the Average Treatment Effect, IV Treatment Effect and Two-Stage Estimator proposed by Lewbel (2012).

The main findings show that children of single-mother families headed by divorced mothers are more likely to work, compared to children living with both parents. This paper found evidence of a direct effect of family structure parents’ determinant on child participation in labor. The main hypothesis is that the absence of the father paired with exposure to family stress arising from marital dissolution is an indicator toward child labor.

This study implies that in order to combat child labor effectively, it is important to understand deeply its several causes and consider ruptures in family structure, such as divorce, as one of these factors. In addition, location and family’s characteristics also play a role on the decision of child labor. For instance, boys living at metropolis areas have less chance to work. Family’s head education and non-work income affects positively the child well-being by reducing the probability of child labor. On the other hand, the number of siblings increases the chance of child labor. Finally, the results of this study suggest policies to raise awareness among parents about the negative effects of child labor on children during both childhood and adulthood, and that social policies need to act beyond legislation and enforcement, but including family mobilization.

This paper estimates the impact of family structure on child labor using an empirical approach to deal with the endogeneity problem of the treatment.

The dramatic increase in the fraction of all Afro‐American families headed by single women accounts for approximately two‐fifths of the Afro‐Euro family income gap. Examines the empirical objections to the conclusion that family structure is a major factor behind ethnic inequality and found to be largely without merit. Also critically examines the more normative and more important objection that the family structure argument undercuts the struggle to achieve economic justice for Afro‐Americans. Argues that an emphasis on family structure does not absolve society of responsibility for inequality, nor does it imply that government activism is futile. The family structure argument recasts but does not negate the struggle for economic justice for Afro‐Americans.

Special attention will be given in this part to the process of decline, which is to be seen as antipodal to development, and which nowadays is all too often neglected. By “decline” we mean here the decline of a whole society. But this definition is not yet sufficient to provide us with a very clear understanding. The statement that a whole society is in decline remains void of real meaning until we possess some concrete conception of what a “whole society” and the process of “decline” are. Since the meanings of both these terms are problematical, further explanation and closer precision are called for.

This study examines the potential impact of capital structure on the financial performance of family-owned firms in Jordan.

Using panel data of 107 listed companies from 2019 to 2021, the authors use a multivariate regression model to empirically examine the role that family firms' capital structure can play in engendering financial performance in the short and long terms.

This study's evidence indicates that family businesses rely on equity as their primary source of funding. This approach has been proven to be detrimental to their financial performance, as evidenced by the negative impact of capital structure on family firms' financial performance in the current study.

Capital structure-related decisions are essential to a firm's performance. Thus, there have been numerous empirical studies examining the relationship between capital structure and corporate performance in various settings worldwide. However, the findings of these studies are inconclusive. Also, there are relatively few empirical studies investigating the association between capital structure and the performance of family firms in emerging countries, particularly Jordan. This study, therefore, addresses this empirical gap in extant literature.

This paper seeks to analyze the family firm's capital structure decisions, focusing on the speed of adjustment (SOA) as well as on the effect of distance from the target capital structure on the SOA towards target short-term and long-term debt ratios in unlisted small and medium-sized family firms.

Methodologically, we use dynamic panel data estimators to estimate the effects of distance on the speeds of adjustment towards those targets. Data for the period 2006–2014 were collected for two research sub-samples: one sub-sample with 398 family firms; the other sub-sample contains 217 non-family firms.

The results show that the deviation from the target debt ratios impacts negatively on the speeds of adjustment towards target short-term and long-term debt ratios in unlisted family firms. These results suggest that family firms, deviating from target debt ratios, face deviation costs, i.e. insolvency costs, inferior to the adjustment costs, i.e. transaction costs. Therefore, family firms stay away from the target debt ratios for a long time than do non-family firms.

The research sample comprises a low number of family firms, therefore for future research we suggest increasing the size of the sample of family firms to get a deeper understanding of family firms' SOA towards capital structure. Additionally, we suggest the analysis of other potential determinants of the speed of adjustment towards target capital structure.

The results obtained suggest that the distance from the target short-term and long-term debt ratios can be avoided if these firms do not depend almost exclusively on internal finance to adjust towards target capital structure. Moreover, for policymakers, we suggest the creation/promotion of alternative external finance sources, allowing reduced transaction costs that contribute to a faster adjustment of small family firms towards target capital structure.

The most previous research focusing on capital structure decisions have focused on listed family firms. To fill this gap, this study examines the speed of adjustment towards target debt ratios in the context of unlisted family firms. Moreover, transaction costs are a function of debt maturity, therefore this study examines separately the speeds of adjustment towards target short-term and long-term debt ratios. This paper shows that the adjustment costs (i.e. transaction costs) could hold back family firms from rebalancing its capital structure.

This study aims to investigate how the timing behavior affects the capital structure decisions of South Asian family firms. A strand of literature is available based on the capital structure of firms in general but inconsistent with family businesses framework and not from market timing outlook. This study looks at the issues from the market timing perspectives of both equity and debt market timing.

The sample of the study is the listed family firms of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The firm-level data are collected from Thomson Reuters' DataStream and the ownership data collected from the countries' stock exchanges and financial statements of the family firms.

The results show that there is strong support for the market timing in the family firms' capital structure. Moreover, the financial crisis of 2007–2009 surprisingly had a positive effect on the capital structure of South Asian family business.

This study looks at the issues from the market timing perspectives of both equity and debt market timing. It provides evidence for supporting the equity and debt market timing effect on the capital structure and financing decision of family firms. It also addresses the impact of the 2007–2009 financial crisis on the capital structure of family firms.

Challenging the static view of family business governance, we propose a model of owner–manager relationships derived from the configurational analysis of managerial behavior and change in governance structure.

Stemming from social exchange theory and building on the 4C model proposed by Miller and Le Breton-Miller (2005), we consider the evolving owner–manager relationship in four main configurations. On the one hand, we account for family businesses shifting from a generalized to a restricted exchange system, and vice versa, according to whether a family manager misbehaves in a stewardship-oriented governance structure or a nonfamily manager succeeds in building a trusting relationship in an agency-oriented governance structure. On the other hand, we consider that family firms will strengthen a generalized exchange system, rather than a restricted one, according to whether a family manager contributes to the stewardship-oriented culture in the business or a nonfamily manager proves to be driven by extrinsic rewards. Four scenarios are analyzed in terms of the managerial behavior and governance structure that characterize the phases of the relationship between owners and managers.

Various factors trigger managerial behavior, making the firm deviate from or further build on what is assumed by stewardship and agency theories (i.e. proorganizational versus opportunistic behavior, respectively), which determine the governance structure over time. Workplace deviance, asymmetric altruism and patriarchy on the one hand, and proorganizational behavior, relationship building and long-term commitment on the other, are found to determine how the manager behaves and thus characterize the owner's reactions in terms of governance mechanisms. This enables us to present a dynamic view of governance structures, which adapt to the actual attitudes and behaviors of employed managers.

As time is a relevant dimension affecting individual behavior and triggering change in an organization, one must consider family business governance as being dynamic in nature. Moreover, it is not family membership that determines the most appropriate governance structure but the owner–manager relationship that evolves over time, thus contributing to the 4C model.

The proposed model integrates social exchange theory and the 4C model to predict changes in governance structure, as summarized in the final framework we propose.

The purpose of this paper is to look into marriage patterns and family structure and changes therein over the period of 50 years. Reasons for change in marriage patterns are also included. It also includes marriage arrangements in the village by time periods. The latter part of the paper explores changes in family structure and its relevant reasons over the decades.

Survey was conducted to attain and assess the required information. An interview schedule was developed as a tool for data collection. Systematic sampling technique was used for the selection of the respondents (aged 55+). These respondents were assumed to have observed the changes over the decades. The results were based on trend analysis from 1960s through 2008.

The results showed that material exchanges on the vital events have declined with the exception of marriage occasion over the period of time. The data shows that most of the marriages were taking place between close relatives from 1960s through 1980s. Substantial decline in these marriages was replaced by corresponding increase in inter-caste marriages after 1990 due to education and economic factors. During the same period, a shift is observed from joint family system to nuclear one.

Policy makers might consider various social trends to manage changes in a traditional society.

This paper focusses on changes in marriage patterns and family structure along with their pertinent causal factors in a rural community of the Punjab, Pakistan.

This paper aims to determine whether family structure influences decision-making styles (DMSs) of Iranian couples.

A self-administered mall survey was conducted to discover the family structures and DMSs of Iranian couples. Data were randomly collected from a sample of 800 spouses in four big cities of Iran. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and multivariate analysis of variance were used to examine proposed hypotheses.

The EFA and CFA results show seven DMSs for Iranian couples. Also, the findings indicate family structure has a significant effect on DMS. In the other words, the results show a difference between DMSs of egalitarian and husband-dominated spouses.

One of the limitations of the study deals with product involvement, because consumer DMSs for each product category may vary. Also, children’s influences are not considered in this study, while gender/number of children may be particularly influential in family structure. Therefore, conclusions made from these findings may be limited to spouses with similar demographic characteristics.

The present research identifies seven DMSs for Iranian couples. It also examines whether family structure is an effective factor for DMS of spouses.