Causes and Consequences of Financial Mismanagement at Older Ages

The consequences of poor financial capability are serious and include making mistakes with credit, drawing down retirement assets too quickly, and being defrauded by financial predators. Because older persons are close to or past the peak of their wealth accumulation, they are often the targets of fraud. Our project will analyze a module in the 2016 Health and Retirement Study (HRS) that we collaborated to design and field. We will evaluate the determinants of financial mismanagement and fraud, the incidence and risk factors for different types of financial fraud, and the consequences of financial mismanagement for older persons’ financial security.