We examine financial literacy in Germany using data from the SAVE survey. We find that knowledge of basic financial concepts is lacking among women, the less educated, and those living in East Germany. In particular, those with low education and low income in East Germany have little financial...

We study how and to what extent private households are affected by the recent financial crisis and how their financial decisions are influenced by this shock. Our analysis reveals that individuals with low levels of financial literacy are less likely to have invested in the stock market and thus...

English Abstract: Flexible retirement is supposed to increase labor supply of older workers without touching the third rail of pension politics, the highly unpopular increase of the retirement age. While this may have intuitive appeal, this paper shows that it might be wishful thinking. Economic...

English Abstract: We document increased old-age mortality rates among Swedish twin mothers compared to non-twin mothers. Results are based on administrative data on mortality for the years 1990 to 2010. We argue that twins are an unplanned shock to fertility in the cohorts of older women...

English Abstract: The purpose of disability insurance (DI) is to protect people with health problems that limit their ability to work. We evaluate the effectiveness of DI benefit programs in delivering this protection by following people's health and financial well-being after the take-up of DI...

This study examines how knowledge about institutional settings and their reform affects the effectiveness of those reforms. We examine this question in the context of social security, the largest social insurance program in Europe, by exploiting time and cross-country variation in pension...

English Abstract: Targeting is an important aim for social policy. Three case studies in this paper reflect typical short-comings in the targeting design of pension reforms. The first case study examines how well work disability and receipt of disability insurance match in Germany. We show that...

English Abstract: Targeting is an important aim for social policy. Three case studies in this paper reflect typical short-comings in the targeting design of pension reforms. The first case study examines how well work disability and receipt of disability insurance match in Germany. We show that...

One important parameter in the decision process when buying a private annuity is individuals´ subjective life expectancy, because it directly influences the expected rate of return. We examine the market for private annuities in Germany and evaluate potential selection effects based on...