Citation

Chesnokova T, Vaithianathan R. BE J. Econ. Anal. Policy 2010; 10(1).

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Berkeley Electronic Press)

DOI

10.2202/1935-1682.2565

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The practice of female genital cutting (FGC) has a long history in Africa and it is thought that over 130 million females alive today have undergone the practice. In this paper, we model FGC as a pre-marital investment. We show how the rat-race nature of the marriage market may result in inefficiently high equilibrium levels of FGC. We argue that in this case, regulation results in a (potential) Pareto improvement and that even weak regulation can be effective in eradicating FGC.