Parental Retirement and Offspring Tourism Consumption: An Intergenerational Transfer Perspective

Abstract

This study investigated the impact of parental retirement on offspring households' tourism consumption using data from the China Family Panel Studies (2018–2022) and a fuzzy regression discontinuity design. The results showed that the retirement of paternal-generation males significantly increased offspring tourism consumption, whereas female retirement exhibited no measurable effect. Mechanism analyses indicated that this effect operated primarily through intergenerational time reallocation rather than direct financial transfers. Specifically, retired paternal-generation men provided time endowments to offspring households, substantially reducing household production burdens. This labor substitution effectively relaxed the time constraints that typically limit tourism demand. Heterogeneity analysis revealed stronger effects when the paternal generation enjoyed good health or when offspring households contained more young children. These findings suggest that intergenerational time transfers substituted effectively for monetary costs to facilitate consumption upgrades, a conclusion robust across a comprehensive series of specification checks.