Chapter 7: Labour market insecurities of younger couples and homeownership in later adulthood in Germany: how important is couples' and gendered risk aversion in the decision process?

Abstract

Homeownership is an important private investment protecting against old-age poverty. With buying a home being an expensive, long-term investment, studies show that insecure employment is a major reason why couples do not make this commitment. We build on these findings, asking what role risk aversion plays in moderating the impact of labour market insecurities on the likelihood of buying a house. We employ multichannel sequence analysis on longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (1995-2019) to reveal couples’ employment trajectories. We utilise regression analysis to investigate the effect heterogeneity of insecure employment trajectories on the probability of being homeowners for couples with differences in risk aversion. We reveal a gender-specific relevance of risk aversion: The higher the risk aversion of the male partner, the more impact couples’ career uncertainty has on the decision to buy a home. There is no such effect of the risk aversion of female partners.