This paper examines (1) the change in commercial banks’ risk taking as states in the United States removed restrictions on bank branching within state borders and (2) the channels through which the removal of these restrictions affect bank risk taking. I find that, after the liberalization of...

A variety of consumer credit products have particular notoriety because of their high prices. The products include some small personal loans, pawnbroker loans, payday loans, automobile title loans, and refund anticipation loans. Critics of these credit products see little or no benefit to using...

In the U.S., women tend to have lower levels of financial literacy than men. This is consistent with a household division of labor in which men manage finances. However, women also tend to outlive their husbands, so they will eventually need to take over this task. Using a new survey of older...

The purpose of this study is to examine associations among financial education, financial knowledge, and risky credit behavior of college students. Using data from a sample of first-year college students, we found evidence that taking personal finance courses in high school and college is...

The German pension reforms in 2001 and 2004 increased the importance of private supplemental savings for retirement. Calculating the appropriate retirement income needed and choosing the right product postulates some degree of financial knowledge, also referred to as financial literacy. This...

This paper looks at interest rate developments in the US and argues that longterm real interest rates are at lows not seen in the past 50 years. It explores competing hypotheses that there is a global saving glut, there is conundrum or that global capital formation has slowed. The dominant view...

The goal of this paper is to investigate access to financial services and prospects for the wealth assimilation of immigrants by studying the financial market behavior of U.S. immigrants, compared to the native-born. Compared to similar natives, immigrants are less likely to own a wide range of...

College students are facing a number of financial challenges, including rising college costs and subsequent escalation in student borrowing to finance their education. Financial aid has not kept pace with rising college costs, and fewer parents are helping to cover these costs, because they...

This study provides new evidence on the role of financial development in accounting for economic growth. To derive feasible policy implications, we estimate not only unbalanced panel regressions with period fixed effects, but also variance decompositions of annual GDP growth rates to examine...

The objective of this paper is to examine the impact of concurrent capital and liquidity constraints. The financial crisis of 2008 prompted Basel III, which addresses both capital and liquidity requirements of banks. In an effort to understand the policy efficacy of Basel III, it is important...