Why Do Europeans Save? Micro-Evidence from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey

Charles Horioka and Luigi Ventura

No DP2024-26, Discussion Paper Series from Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University

Abstract: We analyze the saving motives of European households using micro-data from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey, which is conducted by the European Central Bank. We find that the rank ordering of saving motives differs greatly depending on what criterion is used to rank them. We find that the precautionary motive is the most important saving motive of European households when the proportion of households saving for each motive is used as the criterion to rank them but that the retirement motive is the most important saving motive of European households if the quantitative importance of each motive is taken into account. Moreover, the generosity of social safety nets seems to affect the importance of individual saving motives, with saving for the retirement motive being less important in countries with generous public pension benefits and saving for the precautionary motive being less important in countries with generous public health systems.

Keywords: Altruism model; Bequests; Household saving; Household wealth; Inter vivos transfers; Intergenerational transfers; Life-cycle hypothesis; Life-cycle saving; Precautionary saving; Public health; Public pensions; Retirement; Saving for retirement; Saving motives; Selfish life-cycle model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D14 D15 D64 E21 H55 I18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2024-08, Revised 2025-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age, nep-eec, nep-eur, nep-fdg and nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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https://www.rieb.kobe-u.ac.jp/academic/ra/dp/English/DP2024-26.pdf Revised version, 2025 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Why Do Europeans Save? Micro-Evidence from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (2024)
Working Paper: Why Do Europeans Save? Micro-Evidence from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (2024)
Working Paper: Why Do Europeans Save? Micro-Evidence from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (2024)
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