The Impact of Family Size on Savings and Consumption Expenditure of Industrial Workers: A Cross-Sectional Study

Corresponding Author: Tanvi Kiran Department of Economics, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India Tel. no. +919876867850 Email: [email protected] Abstract: The present study investigated and analysed the impact of family size on monthly savings and consumption expenditure of the industrial workers. The results showed that with increasing household size, savings not only dwindled in absolute terms but also in relative terms as witnessed by decreasing saving to income ratios. Conversely, the consumption to income ratios witnessed an increasing pattern, which is indicative of income being diverted away from savings with every addition to the family size. The MANOVA post hoc analyses revealed that the mean monthly savings of each of the higher family size group (more than 3 members) were observed to be significantly lower than the smallest family group (3 members), which is symptomatic of low propensity towards saving in context of the workers with higher family size. Though, the mean monthly consumption expenditure of family size of 4, 5 and 6 members was observed to be significantly higher than that of the largest family group (7 members), however its consumption income ratio was observed to be greater than that of all the lower family size groups. This is logically plausible as the workers having the largest family size were observed to have the lowest mean monthly income, thereby implying the presence of large number of economically inactive members in this group, which resulted in diversion of a large part of their income towards their consumption expenses. The results of the ANOVA regression analysis confirmed that family size has a significant positive impact on the consumption expenditure of the industrial workers. Further, the reduction of savings due to increased burden of the additional family member corroborated the proposed negative effect of family size on savings of the workers.