Individuals regularly struggle to save for retirement. Using a largescale field experiment (N=97,149) in Mexico, we test the effectiveness of several behavioral interventions relative to existing policy and each other geared towards improving voluntary retirement savings contributions. We find that an intervention framing savings as a way to secure one’s family future significantly improves contribution rates. We leverage recursive partitioning techniques and identify that the overall positive treatment effect masks sub-populations where the treatment is even more effective and other groups where the treatment has a significant negative effect, decreasing contribution rates. Accounting for this variation is significant for theoretical and policy development as well as firm profitability. Our work also provides a methodological framework for how to better design, scale, and deploy behavioral interventions to maximize their effectiveness.
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