Heuristics and Biases in Retirement Savings Behavior

Abstract

Saving for retirement is a difficult problem, and most employees have little training upon which to draw in making the relevant decisions. Perhaps as a result, investors are relatively passive. They are slow to join advantageous plans; they make infrequent changes; and they adopt naïve diversification strategies. In short, they need all the help they can get. Fortunately, many effective ways to help participants are also the least costly interventions: namely, small changes in plan design, sensible default options and opportunities to increase savings rates and rebalance portfolios automatically. These design features help less sophisticated investors while maintaining flexibility for more sophisticated types.

Keywords: Retirement savings, 401(k) plans, behavioral finance