Differential mortality, uncertain medical expenses, and the saving of elderly singles
By: Mariacristina De Nardi, Eric French, and John Bailey Jones.
Contributors: French, Eric; Jones, John Bailey.; Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Research Dept.
Series: Working paper series -- WP-2005-13; Working paper series (Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Research Dept. : Online) -- WP-2005-13.
Publisher: Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago
Published: 2005
Place of publication: [Chicago, Ill.]
Language: eng
Format: Electronic resource
Subjects: Saving and investment -- Effect of age on -- Econometric models
Description: "People have heterogenous life expectancies: women live longer than men, rich people live longer than poor people, and healthy people live longer than sick people. People are also subject to heterogenous outof- pocket medical expense risk. We show that all of these dimensions of heterogeneity are large for the elderly. Can these factors explain their lack of asset decumulation even at very advanced ages and the high saving rate of the income-rich elderly? We answer this question in two steps. We first estimate the uncertainty about mortality and outof pocket medical expenditures as functions of sex, health, permanent income, and age. We then formalize a rich structural model of saving behavior for retired single households, and we estimate it by using the method of simulated moments."--Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago web site.
Notes: Title from PDF file as viewed on 10/5/2006.

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