caa a22 4500 388069279 CHVBK 20180307125142.0 cr unu---uuuuu 161130e199903 xx s 000 0 eng 10.1017/S0022050700022294 doi S0022050700022294 pii (NATIONALLICENCE)cambridge-10.1017/S0022050700022294 Hamilton Gillian Gillian Hamilton is Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of Toronto, 150 St. George St., Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 3G7. Property Rights and Transaction Costs in Marriage: Evidence from Prenuptial Contracts [Elektronische Daten] [Gillian Hamilton] I examine prenuptial contracting behavior in early-nineteenth-centuiy Quebec to explore property rights within families and the efficacy of marital property laws. Drawing on a transaction cost framework, I examine the decision to sign a contract and couples' property rights choices. I find, for example, that couples signing contracts tended to choose joint ownership of property when wives were particularly important to the household. These findings illustrate the potential effects of legal institutions on individuals' behavior (such as the importance of family labor, human capital acquisition, and even mating decisions) and the value of a flexible legal environment. Copyright © The Economic History Association 1999 The Journal of Economic History Cambridge University Press 59/1(1999-03), 68-103 0022-0507 59:1<68 1999 59 JEH https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050700022294 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI 1 research-article jats NATIONALLICENCE 856 40 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050700022294 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI NATIONALLICENCE 100 1- Hamilton Gillian Gillian Hamilton is Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of Toronto, 150 St. George St., Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 3G7 NATIONALLICENCE 773 0- The Journal of Economic History Cambridge University Press 59/1(1999-03), 68-103 0022-0507 59:1<68 1999 59 JEH CC0 http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0 nationallicence BK010053 XK010053 XK010000 NATIONALLICENCE NATIONALLICENCE NL-cambridge