Despite solid theoretical foundations for the notion that poor, borrowing-constrained households will intertemporally manage assets to smooth consumption, the consumption-smoothing hypothesis has not always withstood empirical scrutiny. This paper reassesses the intertemporal asset management...

Most decisions involve variability in two dimensions: uncertainty across states of nature and fluctuations over time. The stakes involved in tradeoffs between these variability dimensions are especially high for the poor who have difficulty managing and recovering from shocks. We assume Epstein...