How much should a family save for retirement? A prescriptive life cycle savings model is presented. Scenarios are developed with simulations to provide implications for personal financial planning. The percent of income to save today depends on the expected lifetime non-investment income...

This study estimates the adequacy of retirement wealth of pre-retirement households using a 1995 national sample of households. Retirement wealth is projected using planned retirement age and portfolio allocation. Retirement needs are estimated from expenditure functions, and 52% of the...

In order to understand optimal decision-making about saving, credit use, investing, insurance, and other financial decisions, it is useful to understand decision rules, such as choosing the action with the highest expected value or utility. To understand why people might decisions inconsistent...

In 2013, 18% of full-time workers aged 35 to 60 who were household heads expected to never retire. We found that factors related to the likelihood of expecting to never retire were more related to a failure to plan rather than a preference for working indefinitely. Most workers stating that they...

We analyzed factors related to the financial risk tolerance of Chinese households, using the 2011 China Household Finance Survey (CHFS). The risk tolerance question was similar to one in the U.S. Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), and we found that CHFS respondents had slightly higher risk...

The Survey of Consumer Finances was used to assess the explanatory power of self-control mechanisms, controlling for other important constructs from the standard life cycle model of saving. The analysis focused on saving goals, foreseeable expenses, and saving rules as mechanisms of...