IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/diw/diwwpp/dp2080.html

Bad Luck or Bad Decisions? Macroeconomic Implications of Persistent Heterogeneity in Cognitive Skills and Overconfidence

Author

Listed:
  • Oliver Pfäuti
  • Fabian Seyrich
  • Jonathan Zinman

Abstract

Business cycle models often abstract from persistent household heterogeneity, despite its potentially significant implications for macroeconomic fluctuations and policy. We show empirically that the likelihood of being persistently financially constrained decreases with cognitive skills and increases with overconfidence thereon. Guided by this and other micro evidence, we add persistent heterogeneity in cognitive skills and overconfidence to an otherwise standard HANK model. Overconfidence proves to be the key innovation, driving households to spend instead of precautionary save and producing empirically realistic wealth distributions and hand-to-mouth shares and MPCs across the income distribution. We highlight implications for various fiscal policies.

Suggested Citation

  • Oliver Pfäuti & Fabian Seyrich & Jonathan Zinman, 2024. "Bad Luck or Bad Decisions? Macroeconomic Implications of Persistent Heterogeneity in Cognitive Skills and Overconfidence," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 2080, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:diw:diwwpp:dp2080
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.diw.de/documents/publikationen/73/diw_01.c.899350.de/dp2080.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andreas I. Mueller & Johannes Spinnewijn & Giorgio Topa, 2021. "Job Seekers' Perceptions and Employment Prospects: Heterogeneity, Duration Dependence, and Bias," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(1), pages 324-363, January.
    2. David Huffman & Collin Raymond & Julia Shvets, 2022. "Persistent Overconfidence and Biased Memory: Evidence from Managers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(10), pages 3141-3175, October.
    3. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2010. "Are Risk Aversion and Impatience Related to Cognitive Ability?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 1238-1260, June.
    4. Garance Genicot & Debraj Ray, 2017. "Aspirations and Inequality," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 489-519, March.
    5. Xavier Gabaix, 2014. "A Sparsity-Based Model of Bounded Rationality," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(4), pages 1661-1710.
    6. Ben Gillen & Erik Snowberg & Leeat Yariv, 2019. "Experimenting with Measurement Error: Techniques with Applications to the Caltech Cohort Study," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 127(4), pages 1826-1863.
    7. Souleles, Nicholas S, 2004. "Expectations, Heterogeneous Forecast Errors, and Consumption: Micro Evidence from the Michigan Consumer Sentiment Surveys," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 36(1), pages 39-72, February.
    8. Robert B. Barsky & F. Thomas Juster & Miles S. Kimball & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1997. "Preference Parameters and Behavioral Heterogeneity: An Experimental Approach in the Health and Retirement Study," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 537-579.
    9. Ralph Luetticke, 2021. "Transmission of Monetary Policy with Heterogeneity in Household Portfolios," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(2), pages 1-25, April.
    10. Krueger, D. & Mitman, K. & Perri, F., 2016. "Macroeconomics and Household Heterogeneity," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 843-921, Elsevier.
    11. Tao Wang, 2023. "Perceived versus Calibrated Income Risks in Heterogeneous-Agent Consumption Models," Staff Working Papers 23-59, Bank of Canada.
    12. Eric A. Hanushek & Ludger Woessmann, 2008. "The Role of Cognitive Skills in Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(3), pages 607-668, September.
    13. Tomas Havranek & Anna Sokolova, 2020. "Do Consumers Really Follow a Rule of Thumb? Three Thousand Estimates from 144 Studies Say 'Probably Not'," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 35, pages 97-122, January.
    14. Filip Rozsypal & Kathrin Schlafmann, 2023. "Overpersistence Bias in Individual Income Expectations and Its Aggregate Implications," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 15(4), pages 331-371, October.
    15. Adrien Auclert & Ludwig Straub & Matthew Rognlie, 2019. "Micro Jumps, Macro Humps: monetary policy and business cycles in an estimated HANK model," 2019 Meeting Papers 1449, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    16. Mattias Almgren & José-Elías Gallegos & John Kramer & Ricardo Lima, 2022. "Monetary Policy and Liquidity Constraints: Evidence from the Euro Area," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 309-340, October.
    17. Greg Kaplan & Giovanni L. Violante, 2014. "A Model of the Consumption Response to Fiscal Stimulus Payments," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82(4), pages 1199-1239, July.
    18. Bernard, René, 2023. "Mental accounting and the marginal propensity to consume," Discussion Papers 13/2023, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    19. Erceg, Christopher J. & Henderson, Dale W. & Levin, Andrew T., 2000. "Optimal monetary policy with staggered wage and price contracts," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 281-313, October.
    20. James Banks & Zoe Oldfield, 2007. "Understanding Pensions: Cognitive Function, Numerical Ability and Retirement Saving," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 28(2), pages 143-170, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gizem Koşar & Davide Melcangi, 2025. "Subjective Uncertainty and the Marginal Propensity to Consume," Staff Reports 1148, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    2. Christa Gibbs & Benedict Guttman-Kenney & Donghoon Lee & Scott Nelson & Wilbert van der Klaauw & Jialan Wang, 2025. "Consumer Credit Reporting Data," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 63(2), pages 598-636, June.
    3. Zaccaria, Niccolò, 2025. "Overconfidence and Information Aggregation," Discussion Paper 2025-004, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.

    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. Adams, Jonathan J. & Rojas, Eugenio, 2024. "Household Consumption and Dispersed Information," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    2. García, Benjamín & Giarda, Mario & Lizama, Carlos & Rojas, Ignacio, 2024. "Transmission mechanisms in HANK: An application to Chile," Latin American Journal of Central Banking (previously Monetaria), Elsevier, vol. 5(3).
    3. Victor Stango & Jonathan Zinman, 2019. "We Are All Behavioral, More or Less: Measuring and Using Consumer-Level Behavioral Sufficient Statistics," Working Papers 19-14, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    4. Crump, Richard K. & Eusepi, Stefano & Tambalotti, Andrea & Topa, Giorgio, 2022. "Subjective intertemporal substitution," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 118-133.
    5. Mark Aguiar & Mark Bils & Corina Boar, 2020. "Who Are the Hand-to-Mouth?," Working Papers 2020-9, Princeton University. Economics Department..
    6. Adrien Auclert & Matthew Rognlie & Ludwig Straub, 2024. "The Intertemporal Keynesian Cross," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 132(12), pages 4068-4121.
    7. Mark Aguiar & Corina Boar & Mark Bils, 2019. "Who Are the Hand-to-Mouth?," 2019 Meeting Papers 525, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    8. Gizem Koşar & Wilbert van der Klaauw, 2025. "Workers’ Perceptions of Earnings Growth and Employment Risk," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 43(S1), pages 83-121.
    9. Marco Bellifemine & Adrien Couturier & Rustam Jamilov, 2022. "The Regional Keynesian Cross," Economics Series Working Papers 995, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    10. Tiziana Assenza & Alberto Cardaci & Domenico Delli Gatti, 2019. "Perceived Wealth, Cognitive Sophistication and Behavioral Inattention," CESifo Working Paper Series 7992, CESifo.
    11. repec:cam:camjip:2507 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Thomas Epper & Ernst Fehr & Helga Fehr-Duda & Claus Thustrup Kreiner & David Dreyer Lassen & Søren Leth-Petersen & Gregers Nytoft Rasmussen, 2020. "Time Discounting and Wealth Inequality," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(4), pages 1177-1205, April.
    13. Francesco D’Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Maritta Paloviita & Michael Weber, 2023. "IQ, Expectations, and Choice," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 90(5), pages 2292-2325.
    14. Kristopher Gerardi & Lorenz Goette & Stephan Meier, 2010. "Financial literacy and subprime mortgage delinquency: evidence from a survey matched to administrative data," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2010-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    15. Dobrew, Michael & Gerke, Rafael & Giesen, Sebastian & Röttger, Joost, 2025. "Make-up strategies with incomplete markets and bounded rationality," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    16. Giorgos Galanis & Roberto Veneziani & Naoki Yoshihara, 2018. "The dynamics of exploitation and inequality in economies with heterogeneous agents," Working Papers SDES-2018-10, Kochi University of Technology, School of Economics and Management, revised Oct 2018.
    17. Zheng Gong, 2025. "When Does Household Heterogeneity Matter for Aggregate Fluctuations?," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2025_624v2, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany, revised Sep 2025.
    18. Almut Balleer & Georg Duernecker & Susanne Forstner & Johannes Goensch, 2026. "The Effects of Biased Labor Market Expectations on Consumption, Wealth Inequality, and Welfare," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 18(1), pages 297-335, January.
    19. Tao Wang, 2023. "Perceived versus Calibrated Income Risks in Heterogeneous-Agent Consumption Models," Staff Working Papers 23-59, Bank of Canada.
    20. Gatt, William, 2024. "Wealth inequality and the distributional effects of maximum loan-to-value ratio policy," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 164(C).
    21. Richard Foltyn & Jonna Olsson, 2024. "Subjective life expectancies, time preference heterogeneity, and wealth inequality," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 15(3), pages 699-736, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • E71 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on the Macro Economy
    • G51 - Financial Economics - - Household Finance - - - Household Savings, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth

    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:diw:diwwpp:dp2080. 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: Bibliothek (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/diwbede.html .

    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.