Is wellbeing higher if the same number of negative events is spread out rather than bunched in time? Should positive events be spread out or bunched? We answer these questions exploiting quarterly data on six positive and twelve negative life events in the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics...

This paper studies consumption-portfolio decisions with recursive utility on a finite time horizon. We postulate essential properties that a bequest motive must satisfy. We show that the parameter which serves as weight of bequest in setups with time-additive utility is both quantitatively and...

In this paper we find sufficient conditions for the continuity of the value of the utility maximizationproblem from terminal wealth with respect to the convergence in distribution of the underlying processes. We provide several examples which illustrate that without these conditions, we cannot...

We experimentally investigate behavior and beliefs in a sequential prisoner's dilemma. Each subject had to choose an action as first mover and a conditional action as second mover. All subjects also had to state their beliefs about others' second-mover choices. Using these elicited beliefs, we...

Let X be a connected metric space, let N be the set of natural numbers, and let be a preference order defined on a suitable subset of X^N. I characterize when has a Cesàro average utility representation. This means that there is a continuous function u from X into the real numbers, such that...

In this paper, we introduce a class of optimized certainty equivalent based on the variational preference, give its dual representation based on ϕ-divergence, and study its equivalent characterization of positive homogeneity and coherence. As applications, we investigate the properties of...

This paper proposes a new theoretical foundation for utility functions over wealth with a constant elasticity. The key idea is that, when decision makers face an underlying distribution of consumption values for which they allocate their wealth to attain, then their utility over that wealth is...

This paper examines an Epstein-Zin recursive utility with quasi-hyperbolic discounting in continuous time. I directly define the utility process and consider a Merton's optimal consumption-investment problem for application. I show that a solution to the Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation is the...

We report a surprising link between optimal portfolios generated by a special type of variational preferences called divergence preferences (cf. Maccheroni et al. 2006) and optimal portfolios generated by classical expected utility. As a special case we connect optimization of truncated...

Recent macro-finance contributions explain a great deal of unconditional asset pricing by introducing persistent consumption risks and rare disasters. Only the volatility puzzles remain unresolved among the longer-established issues in this literature. Motivated by empirical finance...