AEA Papers and Proceedings
ISSN 2574-0768 (Print) | ISSN 2574-0776 (Online)
Can Information Change Personal Retirement Savings? Evidence from Social Security Benefits Statement Mailings
AEA Papers and Proceedings
vol. 108,
May 2018
(pp. 93–97)
Abstract
Despite concern about the viability of public retirement programs and potential undersaving for retirement, we still know little about the impact of government provided information on individual behavior. We exploit plausibly exogenous variation in exposure to the world's largest personalized retirement benefits statement from the US Social Security Administration to evaluate the effects of information and encouragement on individual retirement savings decisions. Using three natural experiments between 2011 and 2014 and administrative data, we find no impact of the statements on individual retirement savings in their employer provided retirement accounts.Citation
Carter, Susan Payne, and William Skimmyhorn. 2018. "Can Information Change Personal Retirement Savings? Evidence from Social Security Benefits Statement Mailings." AEA Papers and Proceedings, 108: 93–97. DOI: 10.1257/pandp.20181041Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D14 Household Saving; Personal Finance
- D83 Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
- H55 Social Security and Public Pensions
- J26 Retirement; Retirement Policies
- J32 Nonwage Labor Costs and Benefits; Retirement Plans; Private Pensions