Many consumers make poor financial choices and older adults are particularly vulnerable to such errors. About half of the population between ages 80 and 89 either has dementia or a medical diagnosis of “cognitive impairment without dementia.†We study lifecycle patterns in financial...

We estimate discount rates of 555 subjects using a laboratory task and find that these individual discount rates predict inter-individual variation in field behaviors (e.g., exercise, BMI, smoking). The correlation between the discount rate and each field behavior is small: none exceeds 0.28 and...

Objectives: To assess whether the addition of a peer testimonial to an informational mailing increases conversion rates from brand-name prescription medications to lower-cost therapeutic equivalents, and whether the testimonial’s efficacy increases when information is added about an...

Lucas (1987, 2003) estimates that the cost of economic fluctuations is low; a social planner would pay no more than 0.1% of (permanent) consumption to eliminate all future business cycle fluctuations. The current paper extends Lucas’ calculations by studying the costs of fluctuations...

General intelligence (g) and virtually all other behavioral traits are heritable. Associations between g and specific single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in several candidate genes involved in brain function have been reported. We sought to replicate published associations between g and 12...

Preferences are fundamental building blocks in all models of economic and political behavior. We study a new sample of comprehensively genotyped subjects with data on economic and political preferences and educational attainment. We use dense single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data to estimate...

The daunting complexity of important financial decisions can lead to procrastination. We evaluate a low-cost intervention that substantially simplifies the retirement savings plan participation decision. Individuals received an opportunity to enroll in a retirement savings plan at a pre-selected...

Intertemporal choices are decisions with consequences that play out over time. These choices range from the prosaic–-how much food to eat at a meal– to life--changing decisions about education, marriage, fertility, health behaviors and savings. Intertemporal preferences also affect...

We evaluate why individuals invest in high-fee index funds. In our experiments, subjects each allocate $10,000 across four S&P 500 index funds and are rewarded for their portfolio’s subsequent return. Subjects overwhelmingly fail to minimize fees. We reject the hypothesis that subjects...