Saving rates and household investment in stocks and business equity are all increasing in income and wealth. Introducing subsistence consumption to a common-across-households Epstein-Zin-Weil utility function is up to a quantitative explanation, in the context of stan- dardized parsimonious...

We analytically show that a common across rich/poor individuals Stone-Geary utility function with subsistence consumption in the context of a simple two-asset portfolio-choice model is capable of qualitatively and quantitatively explaining: (i) the higher saving rates of the rich, (ii) the...

We analytically show that a common across rich/poor individuals Stone-Geary utility function with subsistence consumption in the context of a simple two-asset portfolio-choice model is capable of qualitatively and quantitatively explaining: (i) the higher saving rates of the rich, (ii) the...

US data and new stockholding data from fifteen European countries and China exhibit a common pattern: stockholding shares increase in household income and wealth. Yet, there is a multitude of numbers to match through models. Using a single utility function across households (parsimony), we...

We extend one of the main findings in Bossmann et al. (2007)("Bequests, taxation and the distribution of wealth in a general equilibrium model," Journal of Public Economics, 91, 1247-1271). Bequest motives per se reduce wealth inequality. We show that the result holds for a stronger criterion of...

We present a macroeconomic model calibrated to match both microeconomic and macroeconomic evidence on household income dynamics. When the model is modified in a way that permits it to match empirical measures of wealth inequality in the U.S., we show that its predictions (unlike those of...

This paper compares changes in relative and absolute wealth concentrations to establish if both processes have followed similar trajectories. The findings indicate that while the level of relative wealth concentration has increased recently, it is not extraordinarily high in an historical...

Differences in individual wealth holdings are widely viewed as a driving force of economic inequality. However, as this finding relies on cross-section data, we may confuse older with wealthier. We propose a new method to adjust for age effects in cross-sections, which eliminates transitory...

In this paper I present an explanation to the fact that in the data wealth is substantially more concentrated than income. Starting from the observation that the composition of households' portfolios changes towards a larger share of high-yield assets as the level of net worth increases, I first...