摘要：Recently, a new theoretical framework has been proposed to analyze the
behavior of households composed of two adults. This approach, usually referred to has the
. collective model ., assumes that spouses have distinct preferences and that household
decisions are Pareto effi cient. So far, most empirical studies based on the collective
approach have focused on households made up of two decision makers thus ignoring
households in which there may be more (e.g., couples with adult children or parents in
developed countries, extended families in developing countries). The purpose of this paper
is twofold: fi rst we summarize the main tests that have been proposed to empirically verify
the constraints that derive from the collective setting. We also present a new test that is
equivalent to an existing test but that is easier to implement in certain circumstances. Second,
we test the multiple-person collective model using British survey data. The sample
comprises couples with a single child aged 16 or older. Our results reject the collective
model with one or two decision-makers, but do not reject it when three decisions-makers
are assumed.
