Svarer, Michael. 2007. “Working Late: Do Workplace Sex Ratios Affect Partnership Formation and Dissolution?” Journal of Human Resources 42(3): 583–595.
In this paper, I analyze the association between workplace sex ratios and partnership formation and dissolution. I find that the risk of dissolution increases with the fraction of coworkers of the opposite sex at both the female and male workplace. On the other hand, workplace sex ratios are not important for the overall transition rate from singlehood to partnership. The results suggest that the workplace constitutes a more important marriage market segment for individuals who are already in a partnership, presumably due to higher search cost for (alternative) partners in general.
Michael Svarer is a professor of economics and management at the University of Aarhus. He acknowledges financial support from the Danish National Research Foundation through its grant to CAM and the Danish Social Science Research Council. The author thanks Ulla Nørskov Nielsen for very valuable research assistance, Birgitte Højklint for reading the manuscript, and an anonymous referee, Pieter Gautier, Michael Jansson, Terra McKinnish, Michael Rosholm, Jonas Staghøj, and Rune Majlund Vejlin for very helpful comments. Any remaining errors are the responsibility of the author. The data used in this article can be obtained beginning January 2008 through December 2010 from Michael Svarer, University of Aarhus.