Draft
Household Retirement Savings: Are Spouses Saving Together?
Feb 3, 2017
Improving Financial Decisionmaking
Through our Center for Financial and Economic Decisionmaking (CFED), RAND researchers study how individuals and families make financial decisions and examine how public policy can be leveraged to help improve financial stability.
Improving Financial Decisionmaking Related to Retirement
The decrease in defined benefit pension plans use, coupled with an increase in the life span, is shaping how individuals plan financially for their retirement. CFED researchers investigate how households save for retirement, invest their savings, and spend down their assets in retirement.
Building Financial Health amongst the Economically Vulnerable
CFED researchers design, implement, and evaluate interventions targeted at helping individuals build savings, improve credit, reduce debt, and strengthen financial literacy and capability.
Bringing Together Government Policymakers, Academia, and Industry
The RAND Behavioral Finance Forum is an annual conference and webinar series for federal government, academic, and industry leaders on behavioral finance topics such as retirement security, consumer financial protection, and financial advice.
Featured Research
Recent Publications
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Financial Literacy and Financial Decision-Making at Older Ages February 9, 2021
This paper examines how financial literacy is associated with three types of financial decisions pertinent to older individuals: adherence to timely credit card repayment, stock market participation, and risk diversification of household assets.
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RAND Behavioral Finance Forum: Financial Security Over the Lifespan February 2, 2021
The RAND Behavioral Finance Forum conference, held in partnership with AARP, was presented virtually in 2020. Leaders from academia, government, regulatory agencies, and industry were invited to share the latest research and exchange ideas on how to leverage behavioral principles to promote financial well-being, broadly conceived. The 2020 theme was "financial security over the lifespan."
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Heading into the Holidays, Americans' Financial Difficulties Continue December 17, 2020
In this report, the authors describe results from several waves of a survey fielded through the RAND Corporation's American Life Panel to assess the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on households' financial well-being. The authors find that the share of households experiencing difficulty with paying bills has increased throughout the pandemic. Those who experience difficulties are more likely to turn to informal methods to fund expenditures.
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Alternative Pathways to Retirement in a Household Context September 23, 2020
Provides a more robust understanding of retirement decisions by examining joint work-to-retirement trajectories.
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Effect of Early-Stage Alzheimer's Disease on Household Financial Outcomes March 10, 2020
Our goal in this study is estimate, on net, the financial effects of early-stage Alzheimer's Disease, from the start of first symptoms to diagnosis, on individuals and their families.
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Retirement Security and Financial Decision Making January 2, 2020
Identifies key decisions prior to retirement that may be correlated with insecurity in later years and populations who may benefit most from targeted information.
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Disparities in Minority Retirement Savings Behavior: Survey and Experimental Evidence from A Nationally-Representative Sample of US Households October 24, 2019
Investigates the main barriers to the accumulation of retirement savings faced by minority groups in the United States.
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Financial Knowledge and Portfolio Complexity in Singapore September 20, 2019
This paper reports the first analysis of older Singaporeans' financial literacy using a unique new dataset, the Singapore Life Panel (SLP®).
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The Effect of Housing Wealth Losses on Spending in the Great Recession September 20, 2019
This article represents the first U.S. study employing exclusively household-level longitudinal data spanning the Great Recession to estimate the response of household spending to negative wealth shocks induced by the sharp declines in house prices.
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Choose Wisely: A Study of College Major Choice and Major Switching Behavior August 31, 2018
This dissertation explores the college major decision-making process, both for initial and subsequent major choices, and analyzes the associations between major choice behaviors and student outcomes such as time to degree and probability of graduation.
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Financial Education among Financially Vulnerable Populations in the United States August 29, 2018
Examines if state-mandated financial education improves debt-related and college-going behaviors among economically vulnerable young adults.
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Many Americans Follow Nontraditional Paths to Retirement: Cognitive Ability and Personality Traits Influence This Process July 30, 2018
Most U.S. seniors follow nonstandard retirement pathways. Seniors with better cognitive ability were more likely to follow nonstandard retirement pathways: In a studied sample, 59.1 percent of those with high cognitive ability had a job after age 65.