This paper investigates the return predictability and information content of changes in employee ownership of own-company stock in defined contribution pension plans. Using the US Department of Labor's Form 5500 data from 2000 to 2019, I find that a two-standard-deviation increase in the changes...

This paper presents survey results on the incidence of individual retirement account (IRA) ownership in the United States and the contribution, rollover, and withdrawal activity of IRA-owning households. IRAs play an important role in US households’ retirement saving: In mid-2022, more than...

We show that incorporating defined benefit pension funds in an asset pricing model with incomplete markets improves its ability to jointly match the historical equity premium and riskless rate, and has important implications for risk sharing. We emphasize the importance of the pension fund's...

This paper examines how workers allocated their contributions and assets in their employer-sponsored retirement savings plans within the TIAA system over the 2012 to 2018 period. Consistent with previous research, we find that Lifecycle funds, an auto-diversified target-date fund with an...

Academics, practitioners, and investors at large typically have a preference for making decisions based on a single variable that is supposed to be maximized or minimized. This approach is usually appropriate but it may also be misleading. When selecting an optimal retirement strategy a retiree...

Dr. Brown shares his thoughts on how the defined contribution system could leverage its resources and expertise to provide a new tool for managing the key risks in retirement – longevity, medical expenditures and inflation – with a holistic Retirement Security Product (RSP)

Motivated by a popular perception that Roth accounts are welfare-improving for most people, this paper compares the effects of mandated Traditional (tax-deferred) or Roth (taxprepaid) retirement policies in a controlled laboratory setting. Selection effects, which complicate analyses of...

In the context of pension plans, the employer and the worker have distinct interests and face different risks. The worker seeks higher retirement benefits, while the employer aims to minimize the cost of fulfilling his obligations. To address these diverse needs, the defined contribution plan...