Thema Rente und Vorsorge

Sparmotive von jungen, mittelalten und älteren Erwachsenen: erste Ergebnisse eines neuen Inventars zur Erfassung lebenslaufbezogener Sparmotive

There is some research on personal reasons for saving money in the economic sciences. However, not much is known about the age differences of saving motives. In this vein, the future time perspective (FTP) is known to play a critical role for motivation across the life span. In this study, we introduce a new Saving Motive Inventory (SMI), which also covers saving goals after retirement. Furthermore, ...

The Prospects of the Baby Boomers: Methodological Challenges in Projecting the Lives of an Aging Cohort

In most industrialized countries, the work and family patterns of the baby boomers characterized by more heterogeneous working careers and less stable family lives setthem apart from preceding cohorts. Thus, it is of crucial importance to understand how these different work and family lives are linked to the boomers' prospective material well-being as they retire. This paper presents a new and unique ...

Ten Years of the Riester Pension Scheme: No Reason to Celebrate

Since their introduction, the Riester pension scheme and the individual Riester products have become less beneficial to savers. Contracts concluded today will often lead to lower returns compared to contracts concluded in 2001. From a social perspective, meaning pension benefits in relation to individual saving contributions plus state subsidy, overall returns on all insurance-based products are very ...

Poor Products at the Expense of Pension Policy Holders: Six Questions to Kornelia Hagen

Individual Risk Attitudes and the Composition of Financial Portfolios: Evidence from German Household Portfolios

This paper explores the relationship between the self-declared risk aversion of private investors and their propensity to hold incomplete portfolios of financial assets. The analysis is based on household survey data from the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP) that provides a reliable measure of individual attitudes toward financial risk. Our findings suggest that more risk averse households tend to ...

Unemployment and Portfolio Choice: Does Persistence Matter?

Households can rely on private savings or on public unemployment insurance to hedge against the risk of becoming unemployed. These hedging mechanisms are used differently across countries. In this paper, we use a life cycle model to study the effects of unemployment on the portfolio choice of households in the US and in Germany. We distinguish short- and long-term unemployment and find that, in case ...

Einkommens- und Vermögenssituation der Babyboomer

Die finanzielle Lage und die Rentenaussichten der so genannten Babyboomer (Menschen, die den geburtenstarken Jahrgängen der Nachkriegszeit angehören) gaben in den letzten Jahren in den USA Anlass zur Besorgnis und haben große Aufmerksamkeit erregt. In Deutschland hingegen wurde die Frage, wie es den Babyboomern finanziell geht, bisher nur selten behandelt. Auf Grundlage der Studie "Sparen und Altersvorsorge ...

Die Einkommenssituation und -entwicklung Verwitweter in Deutschland

Es mehren sich die Anzeichen, dass die sozialpolitische Erfolgsgeschichte der Beteiligung alter Menschen am gesellschaftlichen Wohlstand ins Stocken geraten ist. So sinken seit Jahren die Beträge der neu bewilligten Altersrenten und das Realeinkommen im Alter. Die überdurchschnittliche Armutsquote alleinlebender alter Menschen lässt vermuten, dass Verwitwete ein erhöhtes Risiko für prekäre Einkommenslagen ...

Longevity, Life-Cycle Behavior and Pension Reform

How can public pension systems be reformed to ensure fiscal stability in the face of increasing life expectancy? To address this pressing open question in public finance, we estimate a life-cycle model in which the optimal employment, retirement and consumption decisions of forward-looking individuals depend, inter alia, on life expectancy and the design of the public pension system. We calculate that, ...

Zur Entwicklung der Altersarmut in Deutschland

Die Bundesregierung plant einen "Regierungsdialog Rente", um dem Thema Altersarmut mehr Aufmerksamkeit zu sichern. Vor diesem Hintergrund legt das DIW Berlin neueste Analysen zur Einkommensverteilung in Deutschland auf Basis der Daten des Sozio-oekonomischen Panels (SOEP) vor. Sie zeigen, dass das generelle Armutsrisiko für ältere Menschen in Deutschland in den vergangenen zehn Jahren in etwa gleich ...