This article reviews the literature on international comparative household finance. It presents
summary statistics on household balance sheets for 13 developed countries and uses these …

Life-cycle portfolio choice models capture the role of human capital, housing, borrowing
constraints, background risk, and several other crucial ingredients for determining the …

We show that financial knowledge is a key determinant of wealth inequality in a stochastic
life cycle model with endogenous financial knowledge accumulation, where financial …

This lecture considers the case for consumer financial regulation in an environment where
many households lack the knowledge to manage their financial affairs effectively. The …

Household finance—the normative and positive study of how households use financial
markets to achieve their objectives—has gained a lot of attention over the past decade and …

We set out in this study to determine whether individuals with higher levels of financial
literacy are more likely to be active participants in the derivatives markets. Our empirical …

Using unique data on Canadian households, we show that financial advisors exert
substantial influence over their clients' asset allocation, but provide limited customization …

Rising inequality in the permanent component of labor income, henceforth permanent
income, has been a major force behind the secular increase in US labor income inequality …

How do low interest rates affect investor behavior? We demonstrate that individuals “reach
for yield,” that is, have a greater appetite for risk-taking when interest rates are low. Using …

Household financial decisions are complex, interdependent, and heterogeneous, and
central to the functioning of the financial system. We present an overview of the rapidly …