Gender Differences in Intra-Household Financial Decision-Making: An Application of Coarsened Exact Matching
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Just a note for the authors to apologize about the fact that I did not turn in my opinion earlier.
This is a short, clearcut and get-to-the point paper. A number of minor issues could be raised that would only require the authors to provide some more discussion about the metholodogy they use. But the substance of the paper would be unchanged. Therefore, rather than having the authors waste their time, I would recommend a publication decision.
Author Response
Find attached, our response to the comments
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Introduction
The introduction highlights two key issues: intra-household resource allocations and the important role of autonomy which plays a role in leveraging greater power over household resources and hence influencing allocations. However, I did not find any explicit incorporation of autonomy into the identification strategy. This misalignment also appeared in the discussion section.
Moreover, in addition to using an identification strategy not yet applied in studies of similar topic, a motivation statement indicating how this study adds to the existing body of knowledge is needed.
Data
This study draws on the 2008 National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS). The data is out of date.
Is it possible to use some more recent data?
Empirical strategy
The Mahalanobis metric (MM) matching method is used in this study. The author indicated that given the small number of covariates, i.e. less than eight, MM matching is preferred. How many covariates are there in this study?
Results
What does “ZAR” stand for in Table 2? In addition, in Table 2, “Sample” should be “Sample size”.
(Line 171-172) “As expected, expenditure is highest for food (R290), followed by transport (R171). For the remaining categories, expenditure ranges from R54 (education) to R82 (healthcare), except for clothing, which is lowest by far, at R33.” -> What is R33?
A couple of test statistics including two-sample t-tests, joint significance, pseudo-R2, mean standardized bias and LR-test were used to examine quality of the Mahalanobis matching. Please report the test statistics in the Table specifically.
Author Response
See our response to the comments attached
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Please find my comments in the attachment.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
see our response to the comments attached
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Significant improvements have been made. I do not have any further comments. Congrats!
Author Response
Thank you for finding our paper ready for publication.
Reviewer 3 Report
Thank you for providing response to each of my comments.
Please cite the following papers in the discussion section of the paper:
Schubert, R., Brown, M., Gysler, M., & Brachinger, H. W. (1999). Financial decision-making: are women really more risk-averse?. American economic review, 89(2), 381-385.
Dema-Moreno, S. (2009). Behind the negotiations: Financial decision-making processes in Spanish dual-income couples. Feminist Economics, 15(1), 27-56.
Buckles, K. (2019). Fixing the leaky pipeline: Strategies for making economics work for women at every stage. Journal of economic perspectives, 33(1), 43-60.
Sandanayaka, S. T. D., & Sumanasiri, E. A. G. (2021). Does Gender Representation at Decision Making Levels Matter for Better Financial Performance of Local Licensed Commercial Banks in Sri Lanka?. Asian Journal of Economics, Business and Accounting, 32-49.
How does woman decision making matter in healthcare and quality of life improvement in a family setting?
Author Response
Thank you for the comments. I have attached response to your minor comments
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
