Contributions to tax-preferred savings accounts are typically constrained by a contribution limit. These limits influence contributions not just in periods in which they bind, but in other periods as well. I develop a simple life-cycle model in which consumers exhibit "use-it-or-lose-it"...

This paper documents the life-cycle patterns of household portfolios in Canada, and investigates several hypotheses about asset accumulation and allocation. Inferences are drawn from the 1999 Survey of Financial Security, with some comparisons to earlier wealth surveys from 1977 and 1984. I find...

The percentage of Canadian with earned income who contributed to a Registered Retirement Savings Plan increased from 18.7 per cent in 1982 to 46.0 per cent in 1996. This period also saw many changes to the income tax structure. Using household expenditure survey data, I examine the influence of...

Like most other developed nations, Canada has a large income security system for retirement that provides significant and widely varying disincentives to work at older ages. Empirical investigation of their effects has been hindered by lack of appropriate data. We provide an empirical analysis...

The drop in income poverty among the elderly in Canada over the last generation has been well-documented. In this paper, I extend the calculation of head-count measures of poverty to all currently available microdata, spanning the years 1973 to 2003. I then generate consumption poverty measures...