IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/18907.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Financial Education and Choice in State Public Pension Systems

Author

Listed:
  • Julie Agnew
  • Joshua Hurwitz

Abstract

As more and more public pension systems are shifting away from a defined benefit only framework, the complexity of the financial decisions facing public employees is increasing. This raises some concerns about the financial literacy of participants and their ability to make informed decisions. While surveys addressing financial education in private plans are available, little is known about what types of education and advice are offered in public plans. This paper fills this gap by presenting new results from the first National Public Pension Plan Financial Education Survey. The paper focuses specifically on primary defined contribution and hybrid plans. The results indicate that some form of education or advice is offered by every surveyed plan and that the sponsoring entity is actively involved in the development of the programs. However, it appears that legal uncertainties related to advice and education may be a problem for a few plans. In addition, more rigorous evaluation methods to test programs are needed. The paper concludes with suggestions for areas of future research.

Suggested Citation

  • Julie Agnew & Joshua Hurwitz, 2013. "Financial Education and Choice in State Public Pension Systems," NBER Working Papers 18907, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:18907
    Note: PE
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w18907.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lusardi, Annamaria & Mitchell, Olivia S., 2011. "Financial literacy and retirement planning in the United States," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(4), pages 509-525, October.
    2. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S Mitchelli, 2007. "Financial Literacy and Retirement Preparedness: Evidence and Implications for Financial Education," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 42(1), pages 35-44, January.
    3. Lusardi, Annamaria & Mitchell, Olivia S., 2007. "Baby Boomer retirement security: The roles of planning, financial literacy, and housing wealth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 205-224, January.
    4. Sewin Chan & Ann Huff Stevens, 2008. "What You Don't Know Can't Help You: Pension Knowledge and Retirement Decision-Making," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(2), pages 253-266, May.
    5. Angela A. Hung & Joanne K. Yoong, 2010. "Asking for Help Survey And Experimental Evidence on Financial Advice and Behavior Change," Working Papers WR-714-1, RAND Corporation.
    6. Mitchell, Olivia S. & Utkus, Stephen P. (ed.), 2004. "Pension Design and Structure: New Lessons from Behavioral Finance," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199273393.
    7. Gopi Shah Goda & Colleen Flaherty Manchester, 2013. "Incorporating Employee Heterogeneity into Default Rules for Retirement Plan Selection," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 48(1), pages 198-235.
    8. Hackethal, Andreas & Haliassos, Michael & Jappelli, Tullio, 2012. "Financial advisors: A case of babysitters?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 509-524.
    9. Madrian, Brigitte & Mitchell, Olivia S. & Soldo, Beth J. (ed.), 2007. "Redefining Retirement: How Will Boomers Fare?," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199230778.
    10. Lusardi, Annamaria & Mitchell, Olivia S., 2011. "Financial literacy around the world: an overview," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(4), pages 497-508, October.
    11. Angela A. Hung & Joanne Yoong, 2010. "Asking for Help: Survey And Experimental Evidence on Financial Advice And Behavior Change," Working Papers 714-1, RAND Corporation.
    12. James J. Choi & David Laibson & Brigitte C. Madrian & Andrew Metrick, 2001. "Defined Contribution Pensions: Plan Rules, Participant Decisions, and the Path of Least Resistance," NBER Working Papers 8655, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Agnew, Julie R. & Szykman, Lisa R. & Utkus, Stephen P. & Young, Jean A., 2012. "Trust, plan knowledge and 401(k) savings behavior," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(1), pages 1-20, January.
    14. Mitchell, Olivia S. & Lusardi, Annamaria (ed.), 2011. "Financial Literacy: Implications for Retirement Security and the Financial Marketplace," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199696819.
    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. Oscar A. Stolper & Andreas Walter, 2017. "Financial literacy, financial advice, and financial behavior," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 87(5), pages 581-643, July.
    2. Calcagno, Riccardo & Monticone, Chiara, 2015. "Financial literacy and the demand for financial advice," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 363-380.
    3. Lin, Chaonan & Hsiao, Yu-Jen & Yeh, Cheng-Yung, 2017. "Financial literacy, financial advisors, and information sources on demand for life insurance," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 218-237.
    4. Mitchell, O.S. & Piggott, J., 2016. "Workplace-Linked Pensions for an Aging Demographic," Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, in: Piggott, John & Woodland, Alan (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 865-904, Elsevier.
    5. Maarten C.J. van Rooij & Annamaria Lusardi & Rob J.M. Alessie, 2012. "Financial Literacy, Retirement Planning and Household Wealth," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(560), pages 449-478, May.
    6. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2014. "The Economic Importance of Financial Literacy: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(1), pages 5-44, March.
    7. M. Debbich, 2015. "Why Financial Advice Cannot Substitute for Financial Literacy?," Working papers 534, Banque de France.
    8. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.
    9. van Schie, Ron J.G. & Donkers, Bas & Dellaert, Benedict G.C., 2012. "Savings adequacy uncertainty: Driver or obstacle to increased pension contributions?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 882-896.
    10. Sprenger, Julia, 2016. "Financial literacy: A barrier to seek financial advice but not a shield against following it," Ruhr Economic Papers 634, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    11. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2017. "How Ordinary Consumers Make Complex Economic Decisions: Financial Literacy and Retirement Readiness," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 7(03), pages 1-31, September.
    12. Feng, Xiangnan & Lu, Bin & Song, Xinyuan & Ma, Shuang, 2019. "Financial literacy and household finances: A Bayesian two-part latent variable modeling approach," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 119-137.
    13. Shen, Chung-Hua & Lin, Shih-Jie & Tang, De-Piao & Hsiao, Yu-Jen, 2016. "The relationship between financial disputes and financial literacy," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 46-65.
    14. Keane, M.P. & Thorp, S., 2016. "Complex Decision Making," Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, in: Piggott, John & Woodland, Alan (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 661-709, Elsevier.
    15. Andreou, Panayiotis C. & Anyfantaki, Sofia, 2021. "Financial literacy and its influence on internet banking behavior," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 658-674.
    16. Lu, Xiaomeng & Zhang, Yong & Zhang, Yixing & Wang, Lin, 2020. "Can investment advisors promote rational investment? Evidence from micro-data in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 251-263.
    17. Chauhan, Yogesh & Dey, Dipanjan Kumar, 2020. "Does financial literacy affect the value of financial advice? A contingent valuation approach," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(C).
    18. Panayiotis C. Andreou & Sofia Anyfantaki, 2019. "Financial literacy and its influence on consumers’ internet banking behaviour," Working Papers 275, Bank of Greece.
    19. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2008. "Planning and Financial Literacy: How Do Women Fare?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 413-417, May.
    20. Beshears, John & Choi, James J. & Laibson, David & Madrian, Brigitte C., 2011. "Behavioral economics perspectives on public sector pension plans," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(2), pages 315-336, April.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D14 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Saving; Personal Finance
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • H75 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Government: Health, Education, and Welfare
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

    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:nbr:nberwo:18907. 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://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.