IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cep/sticas/-219.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The financial resilience of households: 22 country study with new estimates, breakdowns by household characteristics and a review of policy options

Author

Listed:
  • Abigail McKnight
  • Mark Rucci

Abstract

Some households are less resilient to financial shocks than others. This may be because they have low levels of savings, have limited access to affordable credit, already hold high levels of debt or lack the skills required to manage household budgets. Financial resilience is difficult to estimate because it is a dynamic concept - the ability to recover quickly from an income or expenditure shock. This means that we have to turn to indicators of resilience. In this paper we present new estimates using harmonised micro-data for 22 countries and a number of different indicators focusing on households' savings and debt relative to their income. The results show considerable variation across countries and between households within countries. Some of this variation is likely to be due to differences in financial institutions, welfare states and cultural norms. This research was conducted prior to the Covid-19 pandemic but these baseline statistics on the financial resilience of households highlight just how vulnerable some households were to the financial shocks that followed. In 15 out of the 22 countries included in this research fewer than half of all households held sufficient savings to cover the value of three months' income and many were already over-indebted. How countries respond to the pandemic in terms of protecting households' livelihoods will be an important factor affecting households' resilience and longer term prospects.

Suggested Citation

  • Abigail McKnight & Mark Rucci, 2020. "The financial resilience of households: 22 country study with new estimates, breakdowns by household characteristics and a review of policy options," CASE Papers /219, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:sticas:/219
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cp/casepaper219.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Abigail McKnight, 2011. "Estimates of the asset-effect: The search for a causal effect of assets on adult health and employment outcomes," CASE Papers case149, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE.
    2. Orazio Attanasio & Andrew Leicester & Matthew Wakefield, 2011. "Do House Prices Drive Consumption Growth? The Coincident Cycles Of House Prices And Consumption In The Uk," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 399-435, June.
    3. Tullio Jappelli, 2010. "Economic Literacy: An International Comparison," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(548), pages 429-451, November.
    4. Le Blanc, Julia & Porpiglia, Alessandro & Teppa, Federica & Zhu, Junyi & Ziegelmeyer, Michael, 2014. "Household saving behavior and credit constraints in the Euro area," Discussion Papers 16/2014, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    5. Ansell, Ben, 2014. "The Political Economy of Ownership: Housing Markets and the Welfare State," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 108(2), pages 383-402, May.
    6. Joan Costa-Font & Paola Giuliano & Berkay Ozcan, 2018. "The cultural origin of saving behavior," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(9), pages 1-10, September.
    7. Michael H. Stierle & Stijn Rocher, 2015. "Household saving rates in the EU: Why do they differ so much?," European Economy - Discussion Papers 005, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    8. repec:cep:sticas:/149 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Julia Le Blanc & Alessandro Porpiglia & Federica Teppa & Junyi Zhu & Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2014. "Household saving behaviour and credit constraints in the euro area," BCL working papers 93, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. McKnight, Abigail & Rucci, Marc, 2020. "The financial resilience of households: 22 country study with new estimates, breakdowns by household characteristics and a review of policy options," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121525, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Luc Arrondel & Laura Bartiloro & Pirmin Fessler & Peter Lindner & Thomas Y. Mathä & Cristiana Rampazzi & Frédérique Savignac & Tobias Schmidt & Martin Schürz & Philip Vermeulen, 2016. "How Do Households Allocate Their Assets? Stylized Facts from the Eurosystem Household Finance and Consumption Survey," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 12(2), pages 129-220, June.
    3. Kacper Grejcz & Zbigniew Żółkiewski, 2017. "Household wealth in Poland: the results of a new survey of household finance," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 48(3), pages 295-326.
    4. Hinterlang, Natascha & Moyen, Stephane & Röhe, Oke & Stähler, Nikolai, 2023. "Gauging the effects of the German COVID-19 fiscal stimulus package," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    5. Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2015. "Other real estate property in selected euro area countries," BCL working papers 99, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
    6. Klaus Kaier & Christoph Müller, 2015. "New figures on unfunded public pension entitlements across Europe: concept, results and applications," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 42(4), pages 865-895, November.
    7. Bielecki, Marcin & Stähler, Nikolai, 2022. "Labor Tax Reductions In Europe: The Role Of Property Taxation," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 26(2), pages 419-451, March.
    8. Anna Boldizsár & Zsuzsa Kékesi & Balázs Kóczián & Balázs Sisak, 2016. "The Wealth Position of Hungarian Households based on HFCS," Financial and Economic Review, Magyar Nemzeti Bank (Central Bank of Hungary), vol. 15(4), pages 115-150.
    9. Olympia Bover & Jose Maria Casado & Sonia Costa & Philip Du Caju & Yvonne McCarthy & Eva Sierminska & Panagiota Tzamourani & Ernesto Villanueva & Tibor Zavadil, 2016. "The Distribution of Debt across Euro-Area Countries: The Role of Individual Characteristics, Institutions, and Credit Conditions," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 12(2), pages 71-128, June.
    10. Kaufmann, Christoph & Attinasi, Maria Grazia & Hauptmeier, Sebastian, 2023. "Macroeconomic stabilisation properties of a euro area unemployment insurance scheme," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    11. Ana Lucia Luis & Natalia Teixeira & Rui Braz, 2023. "Portuguese Households Savings in Times of Pandemic: A Way to Better Resist the Escalating Inflation?," Papers 2304.02573, arXiv.org.
    12. Korzeniowska Anna M., 2019. "Sources of Financing of Household Debt in Poland," Folia Oeconomica Stetinensia, Sciendo, vol. 19(2), pages 56-67, December.
    13. Rodriguez-Palenzuela, Diego & Dées, Stéphane & Andersson, Malin & Bijsterbosch, Martin & Forster, Katrin & Zorell, Nico & Audoly, Richard & Buelens, Christian & Compeyron, Guillaume & Ferrando, Annali, 2016. "Savings and investment behaviour in the euro area," Occasional Paper Series 167, European Central Bank.
    14. Maria-Grazia Attinasi & Doris Prammer & Nikolai Stähler & Martino Tasso & Stefan van Parys, 2019. "Budget-Neutral Labor Tax Wedge Reductions: A Sumulation-Based Analysis for the Euro Area," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 15(4), pages 1-54, October.
    15. Katarzyna Kochaniak, 2016. "High value household deposits in the Eurozone: single post-crisis approach vs. national facts," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 47(6), pages 529-552.
    16. Merike Kukk, 2014. "Distinguishing the components of household financial wealth: the impact of liabilities on assets in Euro Area countries," Bank of Estonia Working Papers wp2014-2, Bank of Estonia, revised 10 Oct 2014.
    17. Davoli, Maddalena & Rodríguez-Planas, Núria, 2020. "Culture and adult financial literacy: Evidence from the United States," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    18. Stefan Jestl, 2019. "The Impact of Income Inequality on Household Indebtedness in Euro Area Countries," wiiw Working Papers 173, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
    19. Yiwen Chen & Thomas Y. Mathä & Giuseppe Pulina & Barbara Schuster & Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2020. "The Luxembourg Household Finance Consumption Survey: Results from the third wave," BCL working papers 142, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
    20. Neuberger, Doris, 2015. "Financial Inclusion, Regulation, and Education in Germany," ADBI Working Papers 530, Asian Development Bank Institute.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    financial resilience; income; savings; debt;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D14 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Saving; Personal Finance
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cep:sticas:/219. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/case/_new/publications/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.