I’ve actually never been to CFED’s Assets Learning Conference before but I’ve heard great things. I’m especially intrigued by the following:
This quote from the Huffington Post from Jonathan Lewis: “For an imminent Category Three event, check out the 2010 Corporation for Enterprise Development Assets Learning Conference in Washington, DC, in September. I know, I know...the name is not exactly a heart-pounder, but the content will make your blood race.” Racing blood sounds exciting!
We all know that Americans save less for retirement than we should and than we say we want to. For many, this has catastrophic consequences. But why do we fail to save for own future?
Researchers Ersner-Hershfield, Bailenson, and Carstensen wondered if part of the problem – beyond the self-control problems that behavioral researchers have already hypothesized - is that we just can’t “see” ourselves as older and retirement-ready so we have a difficult time imagining what we will want and need.
Everyone loves the World Cup, but for those interested in decision-making and behavior, the penalty kick is a wonderful distilled study in decision-making under pressure. Think about it: triumph or heart-breaking defeat rests on the decisions of two men, made in nanoseconds while the world watches.
Genevieve Melford, Senior Program Manager, Applied Research, CFED
At its core, microfinance is about empowering low-income people, through access to small-scale financial products and services, to improve their financial condition. Insights from the study of behavioral economics have a lot of value to add to the practice of microfinance. They help us understand how people make decisions, and the way that the immediate context – of their decisions guides financial behavior, and can even undermine the ability to meet financial goals . Armed with this knowledge, we can design products, systems, and financial regulations that meet people where they are, and therefore have the potential to support their financial success in much more significant ways.
We all know that saving money is a struggle. We know we should save more for retirement and emergencies, spend less on vacations, and avoid the (in)famous $4 cup of coffee. Many of us rely on our jobs and our financial institutions to help us: make automatic deductions into retirement accounts, automatic transfers from our checking to savings and even new handy programs that roll the change from our debit purchases into our savings accounts. All of these tools stem from a simple logic...
A Conversation with Alejandra Lopez-Fernandini, Senior Policy Analyst. The New America Foundation
Early last year I had the opportunity to work with Alejandra from the New America Foundation and her partners at MDRC on their fascinating project, AutoSave. AutoSave has a simple and laudable goal: make saving at the workplace so easy it feels automatic. Actually, the initial goal was to create an automatic enrollment for savings. But unlike retirement savings, automatic enrollment is not yet possible for personal savings...read more
I wish there were piano stairs that lead me from my house to the gym. Or-somehow- to increasing my retirement savings. Designing the equivalent of piano stairs that lead us from the status quo to ideal behaviors is one way to think about creating behaviorally informed social policy. ... read more
Guest blogger: Valerie Klein, Consumer Credit Services of the Delaware Valley (CCCSDV)
Each month, hundreds of people call our offices at CCCSDV to make appointments for credit and debt counseling. And each month hundreds of these same people--who were motivated when they called and made the appointment--cancel or simply fail to show up: our cancellation and no show rate each month was about 60%.
1200 G Street, NW