retirement savings

Inflation and Economic Security of the Older Population

• March 13, 2024
• Susan Barnes
• COVID-19, Disparities, Financial well-being, Health and Retirement Study, Inflation, retirement savings

Because the older population are net lenders, they tend to be economically vulnerable to high and increasing inflation. This research used data from the Health and Retirement Study and its supplement, the Consumption and Activities Mail Survey, to assess the…

Risk of Large Medical Expenditures at Older Ages and Their Impact on Economic Well-being

• January 15, 2024
• Susan Barnes
• Financial well-being, Health, Health and Retirement Study, Medicaid, Medicare, Retirement, retirement savings

The House: Is it an Asset or a Liability?

• January 9, 2024
• Susan Barnes
• Disability, Financial well-being, retirement savings

The Enduring Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Americans’ Economic Security

• January 9, 2024
• Susan Barnes
• COVID-19, Disparities, Financial well-being, retirement savings

The House: Is it an Asset or a Liability?

• December 21, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• Disparities, Financial well-being, retirement savings

Most households enter retirement as homeowners and only sell after a spouse enters a nursing home or dies, with recent retirees having greater housing wealth but also greater mortgage debt. We show that the share of homeowners entering retirement with…

The Enduring Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Americans’ Economic Security

• December 21, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• COVID-19, Disparities, Financial well-being, retirement savings

We examine how the pandemic has influenced Americans’ short-term financial security and future retirement stability using longitudinal survey data from the Understanding America Study (UAS), spanning the period May 2018 to May 2022. We find that while, on average, Americans’…

Risk of Large Medical Expenditures at Older Ages and Their Impact on Economic Well-being

• March 1, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• Financial well-being, Health, Health and Retirement Study, Medicaid, Medicare, Retirement, retirement savings

We study out-of-pocket (OOP) medical expenditure risk of the U.S. population ages 55 and older using data from the Health and Retirement Study and its supplemental survey on household spending. We document trends in individual-level OOP spending from 1998 to…

Traditional and Nontraditional Earnings: Demographic, Financial, and Beneficiary Patterns

• March 1, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• Financial well-being, Labor Supply, Older workers, retirement savings, Self-employment

We use the 2014 and 2018 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation to create a schema of earnings that come from employee and nonemployee sources. Traditional earnings are from a job or incorporated business, while nontraditional earnings…

The Alignment of Household Preferences and Financial Decisions Leading up to Retirement

• February 24, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• retirement savings

Explanations for the Decline in Spending at Older Ages

• February 24, 2023
• Susan Barnes
• Administrative data link, Consumption and Activities Mail Survey, Health and Retirement Study, retirement savings