Same-Sex Partnership for What? Evidence from Swedish Register Data

The expansion of legal rights to same-sex couples is afoot in a number of Western countries. The effects of this roll-out are not only important in their own right but can also provide a window on the institution of marriage and the rights bundled therein. In this paper, using Swedish longitudinal register data covering the period 1994-2007, we study the impact of the extension of rights to same-sex couples on labor earnings and fertility. In 1994, Registered Partnership for same-sex couples was introduced in Sweden. Registered partnership conferred almost all rights and obligations of marriage, a notable exception being joint legal parenting (paternity presumption). Joint legal parenting was added as an option to same-sex couples in registered partnership in 2002. We find registered partnership to be important to both gays and lesbians but for different reasons. For gays, resource pooling emerges as the main function of registered partnership. For lesbians, registered partnership appears to be an important vehicle for family formation, especially after the 2002-adoption law. In contrast to heterosexual couples (included for comparison), we find no evidence of specialization among lesbians. The lack of specialization is noteworthy given comparable fertility effects of registered partnership (after 2002) and the fact that the lesbian couples were less assortatively matched (on education) than the heterosexual couples, two factors commonly believed to promote specialization.