Retirement and Economic Behavior

Retirement and Economic Behavior

Author: Henry J. Aaron

Publisher: Washington, D.C. : Brookings Institution

Published: 1984

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 9780815700357

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The book concludes with three papers analyzing behavior relevant to determining the consequences of trends and policies that alter the economic status of the elderly.


Behavioral Dimensions of Retirement Economics

Behavioral Dimensions of Retirement Economics

Author: Henry Aaron

Publisher: Brookings Institution Press

Published: 2010-12-01

Total Pages: 311

ISBN-13: 0815705530

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Deciding when and how to retire are among the most important decisions most people make. Can they be depended on to plan with foresight and make sound decisions? According to standard economic analysis the answer is a qualified "yes." But studies by psychologists, sociologists, and economists themselves raise doubts about this comforting appraisal. This volume by analysts trained in economics and other disciplines suggests that retirement planning and decisions fall far short of the rational ideal. Gary Burtless explains what economic research has to say about retirement behavior. Annamaria Lusardi reports that many people in their fifties and older say they have not even thought about retirement. Mathey Rabin and Ted O'Donoghue show that procrastination can cause huge economic losses. Robert Axtell and Joshua Epstein show that herd behavior explains observed patterns of retirement behavior better than does the assumption of rational decisionmaking. George Loewenstein, Drazen Prelec, and Roberto Weber report that many people incorrectly anticipate what retirement will be like and rationalize whatever decision they have made. David Fetherstonhaugh and Lee Ross report experimental evidence that the effect of Social Security provisions may depend on how these policies are "framed" as well as on the specific content of those policies. These and other authors also explore the broader implications of these behavioral patterns. Copublished with Russell Sage Foundation


Assessing Knowledge of Retirement Behavior

Assessing Knowledge of Retirement Behavior

Author: Panel on Retirement Income Modeling

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 1996-08-13

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 0309589533

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This book brings together in one volume what researchers have learned about workers, employers, and retirees that is important for formulating retirement income policies. As the U.S. population ages, there is increasing uncertainty about the solvency of the Social Security and Medicare systems and the adequacy of private pensions to provide for people's retirement needs. The volume covers such critical behaviors as workers' decisions to retire, people's choices of saving over consumption, and employers' decisions about hiring older workers and providing pension and health care benefits. Also covered are trends in mortality, health status, and health care costs that are key to projecting the likely costs and effects of alternative retirement income security policies and a strategy for combining data and research knowledge into a policy modeling framework.


Pension Design and Structure

Pension Design and Structure

Author: Olivia S. Mitchell

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2004-07-15

Total Pages: 315

ISBN-13: 0199273391

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Employees are being given more and more decisions to make with regards to their pension and healthcare plans. Yet increasing research in the social sciences shows that the decisions 'real' people make are not those of the thoughtful and well-informed economic agent often portrayed in economic research, but are often based on flawed information and made without a full understanding of their financial implications. The contributors to Pension Design and Structure explore theassumptions behind commonly-held theories of retirement decision-making, and the consequences of the growing volume of research in behavioural finance and economics for the field of pension research. Contributors are drawn from a variety of disciplines, and include leading pensions experts.


Portfolio Selection and Asset Pricing

Portfolio Selection and Asset Pricing

Author: Shouyang Wang

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13: 3642559344

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In our daily life, almost every family owns a portfolio of assets. This portfolio could contain real assets such as a car, or a house, as well as financial assets such as stocks, bonds or futures. Portfolio theory deals with how to form a satisfied portfolio among an enormous number of assets. Originally proposed by H. Markowtiz in 1952, the mean-variance methodology for portfolio optimization has been central to the research activities in this area and has served as a basis for the development of modem financial theory during the past four decades. Follow-on work with this approach has born much fruit for this field of study. Among all those research fruits, the most important is the capital asset pricing model (CAPM) proposed by Sharpe in 1964. This model greatly simplifies the input for portfolio selection and makes the mean-variance methodology into a practical application. Consequently, lots of models were proposed to price the capital assets. In this book, some of the most important progresses in portfolio theory are surveyed and a few new models for portfolio selection are presented. Models for asset pricing are illustrated and the empirical tests of CAPM for China's stock markets are made. The first chapter surveys ideas and principles of modeling the investment decision process of economic agents. It starts with the Markowitz criteria of formulating return and risk as mean and variance and then looks into other related criteria which are based on probability assumptions on future prices of securities.


Saving for Retirement

Saving for Retirement

Author: Gordon L. Clark

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2012-01-05

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13: 0191618993

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Understanding the ways in which people save for their retirement is an urgent issue. So much has changed in the last 10 to 15 years, especially in the area of the provision of pensions and retirement income. Around the world, greater and greater responsibility is being allocated to individuals while governments discount their contributions to social security and employers retreat from the provision of supplementary retirement income. This book explores the behavioral revolution and its implications for understanding financial decision-making and saving for the future. Recognizing the profound implications of this research program, it goes beyond issues of risk aversion, framing, and decision-making to consider how social identity and the resources due to people by virtue of their place in society figure in savings behavior. It gives considerable attention to the context of the environment in which people make financial decisions, arguing that this allows a better understanding of the coexistence of sophistication and naivety apparent in patterns of retirement saving. Utilizing databases from the UK, the book provides an empirical foundation to its theoretical arguments, demonstrating how an integrated approach to individual financial decision-making is necessary if we are to address the apparent shortfall in many people's planning for the future. The book concludes by setting the agenda for the design, governance, and regulation of pension savings schemes consistent with delivering cost-effective solutions to pension adequacy. In these ways, it sets forth a strategy for rethinking individual behavior as well as the design of retirement income systems.


The Economics of Aging

The Economics of Aging

Author: David A. Wise

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2009-05-15

Total Pages: 428

ISBN-13: 0226903222

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The Economics of Aging presents results from an ongoing National Bureau of Economic Research project. Contributors consider the housing mobility and living arrangements of the elderly, their labor force participation and retirement, the economics of their health care, and their financial status. The goal of the research is to further our understanding both of the factors that determine the well-being of the elderly and of the consequences that follow from an increasingly older population with longer individual life spans. Each paper is accompanied by critical commentary.


Aging and the Macroeconomy

Aging and the Macroeconomy

Author: National Research Council

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 2013-01-10

Total Pages: 230

ISBN-13: 0309261961

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The United States is in the midst of a major demographic shift. In the coming decades, people aged 65 and over will make up an increasingly large percentage of the population: The ratio of people aged 65+ to people aged 20-64 will rise by 80%. This shift is happening for two reasons: people are living longer, and many couples are choosing to have fewer children and to have those children somewhat later in life. The resulting demographic shift will present the nation with economic challenges, both to absorb the costs and to leverage the benefits of an aging population. Aging and the Macroeconomy: Long-Term Implications of an Older Population presents the fundamental factors driving the aging of the U.S. population, as well as its societal implications and likely long-term macroeconomic effects in a global context. The report finds that, while population aging does not pose an insurmountable challenge to the nation, it is imperative that sensible policies are implemented soon to allow companies and households to respond. It offers four practical approaches for preparing resources to support the future consumption of households and for adapting to the new economic landscape.


Behavioral Dimensions of Retirement Economics

Behavioral Dimensions of Retirement Economics

Author: Henry J. Aaron

Publisher: Brookings Inst Press

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 9780815700630

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Deciding when and how to retire are among the most important decisions most people make. This volume by analysts trained in economics and other disciplines suggests that retirement planning and decisions fall far short of the rational ideal.