We document systematic and significant time variation in US lifecycle nondurable consumption profiles. Consumption profiles have consistently become flatter: intergenerational differences in consumption across age groups have decreased over time. Pooling data across different periods to identify...

Households face earnings risk which is non-normal and varies by age and over the income distribution. We show that, in the context of a structurally estimated life-cycle portfolio choice model, allowing for these rich features of earnings dynamics helps to better understand the limited...