2009

We build upon the growing literature on financial literacy, which studies the prevalence of lack of knowledge about various financial issues, and propose to analyze how much people know about the Social Security rules using both a small pilot survey…

Some policy analysts have voiced concerns that financially inexperienced individuals may fare poorly in personal retirement accounts, to the extent that they do not fully understand the risks associated with investments as well as spending options. One way to possibly…

For respondents in the Health and Retirement Study who gave data release consents in 2004, the SSA W-2 earnings records contain information on annual earnings for years 1951-2003, annual tax-deferred contributions for 1990-2003, and sufficient information to calculate tax-deferred contributions…

About ten percent of the elderly experience economic hardship, defined here as cutting back on food or medication because of cost. Many of the elderly also fail to take up means-tested transfer programs for which they are eligible. Are these…

Both self-reports of work disability and the fraction of workers drawing some form of disability benefit vary enormously across countries with similar levels of economic development. Program parameter variation likely explains a major part of the variation in DI benefit…

While prior research has established the relationship in Europe between the structure of the public pension system and retirement behavior, other types of important analyses have been hindered because of noncomparability of data sets across countries. We propose to use…

In the U.S. and in Chile, there have been heated debates about the relative merits of a decentralized privatized pension system relative to a more traditional social security system. One criticism of a privatized system is that consumers are not…

Individuals in families with less human capital appear to rely more on family transfers of time and money, and to rely less on the market. This implies that some portion of social security income received by individuals in families with…

Divorce rates rapidly increased from the late 1960’s through the 1980’s. Although the majority of divorced individuals eventually remarry, remarriage rates have declined. This research asks, how does changes in household type affect asset accumulation? We use panel data from…