Publications

Article

Using Fresh Starts to Nudge Increased Retirement Savings

By: John Beshears, Hengchen Dai, Katherine L. Milkman and Shlomo Benartzi

We conducted a field experiment to study the effect of framing future moments in time as new beginnings (or “fresh starts”). University employees (N=6,082) received mailings with an opportunity to choose between increasing their contributions to a savings plan... View Details

Keywords: Choice Architecture; Randomized Field Experiment; Savings; New Beginning; Fresh Start; Saving; Retirement; Behavior

2020
Chapter

Building Emergency Savings Through Employer-Sponsored Rainy-Day Savings Accounts

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, J. Mark Iwry, David C. John, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

Roughly half of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. When financial shocks occur during their working life, many of these households tap into their retirement savings accounts. We explore the practical considerations and challenges associated with helping households... View Details

Keywords: Savings; Household; Saving

Article

Liquidity in Retirement Savings Systems: An International Comparison

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, Joshua Hurwitz, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

We compare the liquidity that six developed countries have built into their employer-based defined contribution (DC) retirement schemes. In Germany, Singapore, and the UK, withdrawals are essentially banned no matter what kind of transitory income shock the household... View Details

Keywords: Saving; Financial Liquidity; Retirement; Canada; Germany; Australia; United Kingdom; United States; Singapore

2008
Chapter

The Importance of Default Options for Retirement Saving Outcomes: Evidence from the United States

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

This paper summarizes the empirical evidence on how defaults impact retirement savings outcomes. After outlining the salient features of the various sources of retirement income in the U.S., the paper presents the empirical evidence on how defaults impact retirement... View Details

Keywords: Saving; Financial Condition; Retirement; Investment Funds; Microeconomics; Outcome or Result; Government and Politics; Financial Institutions; Macroeconomics; United States

June 2007 (Revised January 2008)
Background Note

The U.S. Retirement Savings Market and the Pension Protection Act of 2006

By: Luis M. Viceira and Helen Tung

Provides an overview of the evolution of the private retirement savings market in the U.S. since 1990; the management and administration of defined-contribution (DC) plans; the existing evidence about the investment and savings decisions of participants in DC plans;... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Personal Finance; Saving; Government Legislation; Retirement; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry; United States

Educators

Purchase

Article

The Effect of Providing Peer Information on Retirement Savings Decisions

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Katherine L. Milkman

Using a field experiment in a 401(k) plan, we measure the effect of disseminating information about peer behavior on savings. Low-saving employees received simplified plan enrollment or contribution increase forms. A randomized subset of forms stated the fraction of... View Details

Keywords: Saving; Decision Choices and Conditions; Retirement

winter 1999
Article

The Design and Production of New Retirement Savings Products

By: Dwight B. Crane and Z. Bodie

Keywords: Design; Retirement; Saving; Product

1998
Working Paper

The Design and Production of New Retirement Savings Products

By: Zvi Bodie and Dwight B. Crane

2024
Working Paper

Automating Short-Term Payroll Savings: Evidence from Two Large U.K. Experiments

By: Sarah Holmes Berk, James J. Choi, Jay Garg, John Beshears and David Laibson

Automatic enrollment is often used to increase retirement savings. What are the effects of using it (or, alternatively, requiring an active enrollment choice) to increase short-term savings? We evaluate two experiments in the U.K. at employers that enable workers to... View Details

Keywords: Retirement Savings; Participation; Automatic Enrollment; Retirement; Human Resources

January 2025
Article

Automatic Enrollment with a 12% Default Contribution Rate

By: John Beshears, Ruofei Guo, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and James J. Choi

We study a retirement savings plan with a default contribution rate of 12% of income, which is much higher than previously studied defaults. Twenty-five percent of employees had not opted out of this default 12 months after hire; a literature review finds that the... View Details

Keywords: Retirement Savings; Defined Contribution Retirement Plan; Automatic Enrollment; Retirement; Saving; Income; Decision Choices and Conditions

March 2020
Article

Which Early Withdrawal Penalty Attracts the Most Deposits to a Commitment Savings Account?

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, Christopher Harris, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Jung Sakong

Previous research has shown that some people voluntarily use commitment contracts that restrict their own choice sets. We study how people divide money between two accounts: a liquid account that permits unrestricted withdrawals and a commitment account that is... View Details

Keywords: Quasi-hyperbolic Discounting; Present Bias; Sophistication; Naiveté; Commitment; Flexibility; Savings; Contract Design; Defined Contribution Retirement Plan; 401 (K); IRA; Saving; Behavior; Contracts; Design; Interest Rates

January 2021
Case

The FIRE Savings Calculator

By: Michael Parzen and Paul Hamilton

This case follows Carol Muñoz, a member of the Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) lifestyle movement. At the age of 45, Carol is considering retiring and living off the $1 million she has accumulated. Using Monte Carlo simulation, Carol forecasts the... View Details

Keywords: Analysis; Forecasting and Prediction; Financial Strategy; Investment Portfolio; Investment Return; Personal Finance; Saving; Risk and Uncertainty; Diversification; Theory; Personal Development and Career; Financial Services Industry

Educators

30 Jun 2008
Research & Ideas

Rethinking Retirement Planning

Many of us are sailing toward retirement with the hope that Social Security, personal savings, and money saved in an employer's 401(k) or 403(b) plan will add up to the magic sum required to enjoy our... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Banking; Financial Services

Research Summary

Working Hard and Investing for an Early Retirement

I examine consumption, leisure, and portfolio choices made over the life-cycle using a model allowing for semi-flexible leisure and an endogenously chosen retirement date. Under a Cobb-Douglas utility specification, I present closed-form expressions for optimal... View Details

February 2022
Article

Borrowing to Save? The Impact of Automatic Enrollment on Debt

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and William L. Skimmyhorn

Does automatic enrollment into a retirement plan increase financial distress due to increased borrowing outside the plan? We study a natural experiment created when the U.S. Army began automatically enrolling newly hired civilian employees into the Thrift Savings Plan.... View Details

Keywords: Retirement Savings; Automatic Enrollment; Choice Architecture; Nudge; Financial Distress; Retirement; Saving; Borrowing and Debt; Behavior

05 Jul 2006
Research & Ideas

Reinventing the Dowdy Savings Bond

programs," he says. "The money is there at refund time. We just need to help families try to save some of it." Easy To Buy Other recommendations Tufano offers include marketing the program through volunteer tax preparers;... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Banking; Financial Services

2018
Chapter

Work and Workplace

By: Kai Ruggeri, Jana Berkessel, Jascha Achterberg, Gerhard M. Prinz, Alessandra Luna-Navarro, Jon M. Jachimowicz and A. V. Whillans

Work is a major part of many lives. While individual experiences with work will differ—from how long we work to what jobs we have and to what extent we enjoy them—almost everyone is affected by employment, whether they have a job or not. Decades of research in the... View Details

Keywords: Workplace; Behavioral Insights; Retirement Savings; Working Conditions; Employees; Performance; Happiness; Health; Job Search; Change