A large literature has examined factors leading to filing for personal bankruptcy, but little is known about household … borrowing after bankruptcy. Using data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, we find that relative to comparable nonfilers …, bankruptcy filers generally have more limited access to unsecured credit but borrow more secured debt post bankruptcy, and they …

thereafter. This, and similar results using the likelihood of reentering bankruptcy, suggest that there may be an optimal time in … results have implications for the reform and design of bankruptcy systems. …

In this paper, I construct a model of an exchange economy in which bankruptcy arises in a manner similar to what we … highlight some welfare effects of bankruptcy. …

This paper demonstrates the important role of job displacement in the household bankruptcy decision. I develop a … dynamic, forward-looking model of unemployment and bankruptcy where persistent negative income shocks increase a household …'s likelihood of filing for bankruptcy both immediately and in the future. Consistent with the model's predictions, I find that …

Are consumers who have filed for personal bankruptcy before excluded from the unsecured credit market? Using a unique … default risk--those with a bankruptcy history. On average, over one-fifth of personal bankruptcy filers receive at least one … offer in a given month, with the likelihood being even higher for those who filed for bankruptcy within the previous two …

Consumer bankruptcy laws, which vary across states and over time, permit debtors to keep assets below a statutory … debts, but they also provide a crude form of consumption insurance. We combine information on state-level bankruptcy laws … bankruptcy rates, (2) households that are more likely to simultaneously hold low-return liquid assets and owe high-cost unsecured …

The recent explosion in personal bankruptcy filings has motivated research into whether credit markets are being … bankruptcy exemptions across states. We note that the literature has focused on aggregate household credit, making no distinction …

The key feature of the modern U.S. personal bankruptcy law is to provide debtors a financial fresh start through debt …. In this paper, we test this fresh start argument by providing the first estimate of the effect of personal bankruptcy … the endogenous self-selection of bankruptcy filing and allows for dependence over time for the same household. We find …

obtain precise time-specific estimates of the bankruptcy cost parameter and consistently reject the null hypothesis of …