In this paper I study the role of generational differences in saving. My main evidence is an empirical analysis based on Norwegian data that show a tendency for older birth cohorts to have higher saving rates, but that the differences are small and statistically insignificant. Consequently, the...

Reduced form estimations of precautionary saving with respect to labor market risk have hitherto failed to consider that a decrease of say unemployment probability or an increase in unemployment insurance (UI) generosity affects saving not only by reducing the expected variance in earnings but...

This paper studies the determinants of inequality in an infnitehorizon general equilibrium model. Missing capital markets decreases motivations for capital accumulation among the poor, while uncertainty about future income leads to precautionary savings. The different returns to saving faced by...

The aim of this paper is to investigate income, saving and consumption for households around retirement age. When doing this, there are different objectives which can be analyzed. First of all it is possible to get some insight of welfare of elderly when they reach retirement. Second, it is...

This study presents a new database, the Swedish National Wealth Database (SNWD), which contains annual data on private, public and national wealth and sectoral saving rates in Sweden over the past two centuries. The paper reviews previous investigations of national wealth, compares their...

In this paper we study the importance of marriage for interstate risk sharing. We find that US states in which married couples account for a higher share of the population are less exposed to state-specific output shocks. Thus, marriages do not just improve the allocation of risk at the...

The temporal interdependence between saving and output has been in focus in a number of recent empirical studies. Results from these studies have compelled some authors to question the traditional notion of a causal chain where saving leads growth through capital accumulation. This paper...

I study to what extent voters are forward looking and how future income affects the voting decision. Particularly, I estimate the effect of both transitory and permanent income on preferences for different parties using a panel data set from the Norwegian Election Study. To construct a proxy for...

This paper studies the impact of permanent and transitory shocks to income on parental investments in children. We use panel data on family income, and an index of investments in children in time and goods, from the Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. Consistent with the...

This paper reviews four well known theoretical models of private bequest behavior, notes their differing implications for public policy, and discusses a way of empirically discriminating among them. Then it implements the test with micro data from Sweden (LLS) and the U.S. (PSID). The so-called...