There is ample empirical evidence documenting widespread financial illiteracy and limited pension knowledge. At the same time, the distribution of wealth is widely dispersed and many workers arrive on the verge of retirement with few or no personal assets. In this paper, we investigate the...

This paper explores who is financially literate, whether people accurately perceive their own economic decision-making skills, and where these skills come from. Self-assessed and objective measures of financial literacy can be linked to consumers' efforts to plan for retirement in the American...

We study entrepreneurship among Baby Boomers using data from the US Health and Retirement Study (HRS). Using two different definitions of entrepreneurship (being self-employed and being a business owner), we compare entrepreneurs to non-entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs who were age 52–65 in the...

We analyze older individuals' debt and financial vulnerability using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and the National Financial Capability Study (NFCS). Specifically, in the HRS we examine three different cohorts (individuals age 56–61) in 1992, 2004, and 2010 to evaluate...

Relatively little is known about why people fail to plan for retirement and whether planning and information costs might affect retirement saving patterns. This chapter reports on a purpose-built survey module on planning and financial literacy for the Health and Retirement Study which measures...

We present new evidence on financial literacy and retirement preparation in the Netherlands based on two surveys conducted before and after the onset of the financial crisis. We document that while financial knowledge did not increase from 2005 to 2010, significantly more individuals planned for...

There is ample empirical evidence documenting widespread financial illiteracy and limited pension knowledge. At the same time, the distribution of wealth is widely dispersed and many workers arrive on the verge of retirement with few or no personal assets. In this paper, we investigate the...