Research
Work in progress and papers under review. Full PDFs are linked below.
Examines what happens to wealth across generations when growth slows and pay-as-you-go pension budgets stop balancing. Closing the gap by raising contribution rates rather than cutting benefits squeezes the net wages out of which workers save, while retirees keep earning returns on past contributions above the growth rate of the economy. An overlapping-generations model shows that slow growth tilts wealth toward the elderly, the more so the more generous the pension system. European household data confirm it: the elderly are wealthiest, and inheritances largest, where pensions are generous and growth has been slow, and during the 2010–2023 slowdown retired cohorts gained wealth fastest, and workers slowest, in generous, slow-growth countries.
Examines how household wealth responds to interest rate changes using a life-cycle model. Middle-aged and wealthier households hold more long-term assets, matching observed U.S. patterns. Declining rates boost wealth inequality while rising rates reduce it — though these effects are partly offset by changes in human capital and Social Security benefit valuations.
An efficient computational method for estimating structural model variants, using approximations of the relationship between moments and parameters and requiring only sparse model discontinuities. Applications to corporate finance and portfolio choice models demonstrate its use for identification, robustness, and model misspecification.
Using a calibrated life-cycle model, quantifies how labor market risk reduces workers' private valuation of Social Security by roughly 46%. For workers under 30, the certainty-equivalent value is negative, with systematic risk exposure peaking later in the lifecycle.