The spread of the state subsidized private pension scheme (Riester pension), taken as a whole, still continues very dynamically. Ten years after the introduction of the Riester pension, however, its distribution among certain groups of the population remains fairly low. One reason seems to be...

Understanding how households form their long-term saving and investment decisions to shoulder risks not covered by social security systems has been of primary importance in all the countries which, like Germany, introduced major reforms to face the challenges of an aging population. This paper...

We investigate how nutritional status responded to economic growth in Italy during 1861-1911. By combining household-level data on food consumption with population censuses, we estimate that the incidence of undernutrition decreased by about 10-15 percent between 1881 and 1901. Consumption of...