Search Results
Working Paper
Wealth Concentration in the United States Using an Expanded Measure of Net Worth
Defined benefit (DB) pensions and Social Security are two important resources for financing retirement in the United States. However, these illiquid, non-market forms of wealth are typically excluded from measures of net worth. To the extent that these broadly held resources substitute for savings, measures of wealth inequality that do not account for DB pensions and Social Security may be overstated. This paper develops an alternative, expanded wealth concept, augmenting precise net worth data from the Survey of Consumer Finances with estimates of DB pension and expected Social Security ...
Working Paper
Wealth Distribution and Retirement Preparation among Early Savers
This paper develops a new combined-wealth measure by augmenting data on net worth from the Survey of Consumer Finances with estimates of defined benefit (DB) pension and expected Social Security wealth. We use this concept to explore retirement preparation among two groups of households in pre-retirement years (aged 40 through 49 and 50 through 59), and to explore the concentration of wealth. We find evidence of moderate, but rising, shortfalls in retirement preparation. We also show that including DB pension and Social Security wealth results in markedly lower measures of wealth ...
Working Paper
Labor Force Transitions at Older Ages : Burnout, Recovery, and Reverse Retirement
Partial and reverse retirement are two key behaviors characterizing labor force dynamics for individuals at older ages, with half working part-time and over a third leaving and later re-entering the labor force. The high rate of exit and re-entry is especially surprising given the declining wage profile at older ages and opportunities for re-entry in the future being uncertain. In this paper we study the effects of wage and health transition processes as well as the role of accrues work-related strain on the labor force participation on older males. We find that a model incorporating a work ...
Working Paper
Occupational Choice, Retirement, and the Effects of Disability Insurance
There is much variation in the physical requirements across occupations, giving rise to great differences in later-life productivity, disability risk, and the value of Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). In this paper, I look at how such differences across occupations affect initial career choice as well as the extent to which SSDI, which insures shocks to productivity due to disability, prompts more people to choose physically intense occupations. Using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and the Current Population Survey (CPS), I estimate a dynamic model of occupational ...
Discussion Paper
Recent Trends in Wealth-Holding by Race and Ethnicity : Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances
Data from the newly released 2016 Survey of Consumer Finances show wealth has grown for families across race and ethnicity groups since 2013, but substantial disparities between groups persist.
Journal Article
Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2013 to 2016: Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances
Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances The Federal Reserve Board's Survey of Consumer Finances for 2016 provides insights into the evolution of family income and net worth since the previous time the survey was conducted, in 2013. The survey shows that, over the 2013-16 period, the median value of real (inflation-adjusted) family income before taxes rose 10 percent, and mean income increased 14 percent. Real median net worth increased 16 percent, and mean net worth increased 26 percent. The data also indicate that gains in income and net worth are broad based, occurring across many ...
Working Paper
Wealth Distribution and Retirement Preparation Among Early Savers
This paper develops a new combined wealth measure using data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, by augmenting data on net worth with estimates of defined benefit (DB) pension wealth and expected Social Security wealth. We use this combined wealth concept to explore retirement preparation among groups of households in their pre-retirement years (40-49 and 50-59) and also to explore the concentration of wealth. We find evidence of moderate, but rising, shortfalls in retirement preparation. We also show that including DB pension and Social Security wealth results in markedly lower measures of ...