We examine the effects of self-control mechanisms on saving behavior using the 2013 Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), following the assumptions of research that analyzed the 1998 SCF. Self-control mechanisms include saving goals, foreseeable expenses, and saving rules. We find a positive effect...

A life-cycle savings model was tested to analyze consumption patterns of elderly U.S. households, using the 1990 and 1991 BLS Interview Survey of Consumer Expenditures. The model implies substantial, planned decreases in consumption after retirement, regardless of income patterns. The empirical...

Positive household finance attempts to describe, explain, and perhaps predict behavior. Some researchers have analyzed household survey data to estimate household preferences, which then could be used as the basis for prescriptions for household behavior. In order to prescribe actions or...

The Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) is the most frequently used dataset for research in this journal, but many researchers and readers do not fully understand some of the dataset's complex details. This article provides insight into important issues that researchers and readers need to...

1. This research examines the potential impact of the stock market crash of 2008-2009 on U.S. working households. The Great Recession caused financial problems for many households in terms of unemployment, business losses, and decreases in real estate values, but the broadly based decreases in...

This article describes the current status and trends in the past three decades (1990-2019) of the Journal of Financial Counseling and Planning (JFCP). Since its first issue published in 1990, JFCP has become a major research outlet in consumer finance. It publishes cutting-edge, peer reviewed,...

This research sought to further understanding of factors related to low-income household saving behavior. Saving behavior, defined as whether a household spent less than income, was analyzed by applying institutional theory, which proposes that households' institutional environment has a...

The purpose of this study was to examine associations between saving goals and saving behavior from a perspective of Maslow's Hierarchy. Using 1998-2007 Surveys of Consumer Finance data, we analyzed responses given to an open-ended saving reason question, and categorized responses into six...

Fudenberg's (2006) model of bounded rationality posits that greater complexity should result in households being less likely to achieve rational outcomes. Some households have higher complexity in retirement planning because expected retirement income varies during retirement. Based on 1995 to...

Economists conducting normative analyses of household financial decisions typically assume specific values of parameters of the household utility function. We review 12 normative analyses and discuss justifications for the personal discount rates assumed. None of the normative articles cited an...