Empirical research based on panel data has to pay special attention to measurement errors. Utility maximization often yields nonlinear decision rules in which measurement errors enter in a multiplicative way. The usual strategy to deal with them consists of taking log-linear approximations of...

We test for excess sensitivity of consumption to predicted income growth using a 1989–93 panel survey of Italian households that includes measures of subjective income and inflation expectations. These expectations provide a powerful instrument for predicting income growth. Controlling for the...

In a multicommodity life cycle setting with uncertainty and time additive expected utility, this note finds necessary and sufficient conditions on preferences for all but one optimal decision each period to be independent of the future and of uncertainty.