Human capital, true love, and gender roles: is sex destiny?

We assume optimal specialization (in the nuclear family) involves one partn er doing 'homework' and the other 'wagework. Basic human capital for one or the other is Imparted to individuals through early childhood training. Mat es are chosen on the basis of noneconomic criteria-'true love'. Because lov e strikes randomly after basic human capital is acquired, a coordination pr oblem arises in choosing complementary specializations. Even with no discri mination, there exist equilibria characterized by gender roles - perfect co rrelation between sex and family roles. There may also exist other equilibr ia in which the correlation between sex and family roles is imperfect and i ndividuals are trained by aptitude. We rank the equilibria when they coexis t and demonstrate that affirmative action policies can increase average wel fare by eliminating some equilibria. The analysis is conducted in a framewo rk which characterizes individuals by training, by aptitude, and by family role in a 2 x 2 x 2 model. In this framework, we formalize the equality of the sexes as well as the relative importance of nature versus nurture and v arious types of training. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserve d. JEL classification: D1; J2.