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This study examined the influence of socioeconomic status (SES) on risk prioritisation. Participants ranked 28 hazards according to how risky they considered them to be for the South African society. The results showed SES had an influence on hazard prioritisation, e.g., alcohol was considered the most significant societal hazard by low SES individuals, but was ranked 10th by high SES individuals. High SES individuals on the other hand, were significantly more concerned than low SES individuals about personal security risks. A second aim of the study was to delineate the interaction between SES and gender, and whether this also influenced risk perception. The data revealed statistically significant interactions between gender and SES for a number of hazards including personal security hazards, government corruption, climate change, and alcohol. SES influenced risk perceptions even at the level of gender so that individuals of similar gender but different SES perceived risks from the same hazard disparately. This suggests that people's socioeconomic status influenced how they perceived risks, irrespective of gender. Together, these findings suggest that SES is an important determinant of people's risk perceptions, and that it can modify even the effects of gender. These findings also have practical implications because they imply that risk perceptions are not similar between socio-economic groupings. As such, assessments derived in high SES or developed contexts may not adequately describe low SES or developing contexts. Context-relevant data are, therefore, key to successful risk management and communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most studies that explore collective models of intra-household decision-making use economic outcomes such as human capital, earnings, assets, and relative income shares as proxies of the relative distribution of bargaining power. These studies, however, fail to incorporate important measures of control over and management of the economic resources within households. In the current study, a direct measure of financial decision-making power within the household is used to directly assess the distribution of bargaining power. Coarsened exact matching, an identification strategy not yet applied in studies of this nature, is applied to couple-level observational data from South Africa's longitudinal National Income Dynamics Study. The influence of gender differences in intra-household decision-making on resource allocations to per capita household expenditure is assessed. In the case of greater financial decision-making power in couples being assigned to wives rather than husbands, per capita household expenditure on education increases significantly. The empowerment of women with financial decision-making power therefore holds the promise of realizing the benefits of investments in human capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]