PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Wenchao Li AU - Changcheng Song AU - Shu Xu AU - Junjian Yi TI - High Sex Ratios and Household Portfolio Choice in China AID - 10.3368/jhr.57.2.1217-9245R2 DP - 2020 Jan 01 TA - Journal of Human Resources PG - 1217-9245R2 4099 - http://jhr.uwpress.org/content/early/2020/01/08/jhr.57.2.1217-9245R2.short 4100 - http://jhr.uwpress.org/content/early/2020/01/08/jhr.57.2.1217-9245R2.full AB - This paper studies how high sex ratios (more men than women) affect household portfolio choice. Using data from a nationally representative Chinese household finance survey, we find that a 1 standard deviation increase in the sex ratio would raise the stock market participation rate by 2.9 percentage points or 52.2 percent for families with a son relative to families with a daughter. Our estimates imply that rising sex ratios explain around 10 percent of the significant growth in China’s stock market size in recent decades.