Evaluating Micro-Survey Estimates of Wealth and Saving

Abstract

The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, part of a consortium that includes parallel centers at the University of Michigan and the National Bureau of Economic Research, was established in 1998 through a grant from the Social Security Administration. The Center's mission is to produce first-class research and forge a strong link between the academic community and decision makers in the public and private sectors around an issue of critical importance to the nation's future. To achieve this mission, the Center sponsors a wide variety of research projects, transmits new findings to a broad audience, trains new scholars, and broadens access to valuable data sources.

Economic Consequences of the Great Recession: Evidence from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics

“…This is somewhat surprising in view of the larger sample size in the PSID. However, it is consistent with earlier analyses that suggest that the wealth estimates of the PSID are subject substantial measurement error (Bosworth and Smart, 2009). The variability is most marked for percentiles of income and percentiles of wealth, and it is most likely due to the fact that the estimates of income and wealth are subject to significant transitory variation-unlike age, education and region-and they are more likely to include substantial measurement error.…”

The Joy of Giving or Assisted Living? Using Strategic Surveys to Separate Public Care Aversion from Bequest Motives

“…Second, we make adjustments related to cohort effects 24 . Following the research of Bosworth and Smart (2009), we conclude that because of cohort differences, our sample is 2.16 times wealthier than the AHEAD sample 25,26…”

Generations of Advantage. Multigenerational Correlations in Family Wealth

“…Our main wealth measure is family net worth, which is the sum of all financial assets, real assets, and home equity, minus any financial obligations. The PSID wealth measures compare favorably to those of the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), often considered the gold standard among wealth surveys, attesting to the high validity of the former (Pfeffer et al 2016;Bosworth and Smart 2009). One exception is a lack of coverage of the very top of the wealth distribution in the PSID, although the PSID does contain many multi-millionaires (no topcoding).…”