This paper uses micro data from four OECD countries (the United States, Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands), to assess the determinants of household debt holding and to investigate whether or not credit constraints are important for household debt holding. We extend the existing literature in...

We propose a novel utility representation for preferences over risky timed outcomes. The weighted temporal utility model generalizes many well known utility functions for intertemporal decision making under risk. A decision maker with a weighted temporal utility function can have time consistent...

This study analyses the relation between perceived health status and intertemporal choice. We use data from experiments with real monetary rewards conduEted among students in South Africa to estimate risk and time preferences. These experimental data, based on muitiple price lists developed by...

Interest rate caps, also called usury ceilings, are a widely used policy tool to protect consumers from excessive charges by loan providers. However, they are often cited as a barrier for the advancement of financial inclusion, as they may reduce the incentives to provide loans to lower-income...

I revisit the Diamond-Dybvig model of liquidity insurance in the presence of hidden trades. The key result is that in this environment deposit-taking banks are not necessary for the efficient provision of liquidity. Mutual funds are constrained efficient when supplemented with the same...

I analyze welfare properties of mutual funds in the Diamond-Dybvig model with two sources of aggregate risk: undiversifiable interest rate risk and shocks to aggregate liquidity demand. Mutual funds are inefficient when the economy faces undiversifiable interest rate risk. However, if only...

Many empirical studies on intertemporal choice report preference reversals in the sensethat a preference between a small reward to be received soon and a larger reward to bereceived later reverses as both rewards are equally delayed. Such preference reversals arecommonly interpreted as...

Anecdotally, physical activity appears to be a textbook example of time inconsistency, which is the failure to follow through on ex-ante preferences and plans. Interestingly, our longitudinal survey finds that, over a fortnight, exercising more than preferred/planned is actually more prevalent...

We study the power of social incentives to increase individuals' investment in preventive health using small financial incentives with group conditionality. In a field experiment in El Salvador, we compare those to equivalent individual incentives. Despite the uncertainty about others' behavior,...