Explore the vast range of titles available.

Young Americans are heavily reliant on debt and have clear financial literacy shortcomings. In this paper, we study the effects of exposure to financial training on debt outcomes in early adulthood among a large and representative sample of young Americans. Variation in exposure to financial training comes from statewide changes in high school graduation requirements. Using a flexible event study approach, we find that both mathematics and financial education, by and large, decrease reliance on nonstudent debt and improve repayment behavior. Economics training, on the other hand, increases both the likelihood of holding outstanding debt and the prevalence of repayment difficulties.

The current study examined the role of attachment insecurity, locus of control, and parental financial communication on the financial behavior of emerging adults from a family financial socialization theory perspective. Data were used from the Emerging Adult Financial Capability Study, the sample consisted of emerging adult college students (N = 321) from a large southeastern university in the United States. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the direct and indirect effects as well as the overall fit of the model that was constructed according to family financial socialization theory. Results suggested that increased attachment insecurity predicted decreased financial communication from parents and a decreased perception of an internal locus of control. Emerging adults who received greater financial instruction (both direct and indirect) and who felt they had a greater ability to influence outcomes in their life engaged in more sound financial behavior. Results also suggested that financial communication and locus of control mediated the relationship between attachment insecurity and financial behavior. The findings supported the inclusion of attachment as an important family relationship variable in the financial socialization process, as well as the structure of a conceptual model of family financial socialization theory.

The past decade has seen a rise in both economic insecurity and frequency of physical pain. The current research reveals a causal connection between these two growing and consequential social trends. In five studies, we found that economic insecurity produced physical pain and reduced pain tolerance. In a sixth study, with data from 33,720 geographically diverse households across the United States, economic insecurity predicted consumption of over-the-counter painkillers. The link between economic insecurity and physical pain emerged when people experienced the insecurity personally (unemployment), when they were in an insecure context (they were informed that their state had a relatively high level of unemployment), and when they contemplated past and future economic insecurity. Using both experimental-causal-chain and measurement-of-mediation approaches, we also established that the psychological experience of lacking control helped generate the causal link from economic insecurity to physical pain. Meta-analyses including all of our studies testing the link from economic insecurity to physical pain revealed that this link is reliable. Overall, the findings show that it physically hurts to be economically insecure.

Although there is a large gap between Black and White American life expectancies, the gap fell 48.9% between 1990 and 2018, mainly due to mortality declines among Black Americans. We examine age-specific mortality trends and racial gaps in life expectancy in high- and low-income US areas and with reference to six European countries. Inequalities in life expectancy are starker in the United States than in Europe. In 1990, White Americans and Europeans in high-income areas had similar overall life expectancy, while life expectancy for White Americans in low-income areas was lower. However, since then, even high-income White Americans have lost ground relative to Europeans. Meanwhile, the gap in life expectancy between Black Americans and Europeans decreased by 8.3%. Black American life expectancy increased more than White American life expectancy in all US areas, but improvements in lower-income areas had the greatest impact on the racial life expectancy gap. The causes that contributed the most to Black Americans’ mortality reductions included cancer, homicide, HIV, and causes originating in the fetal or infant period. Life expectancy for both Black and White Americans plateaued or slightly declined after 2012, but this stalling was most evident among Black Americans even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. If improvements had continued at the 1990 to 2012 rate, the racial gap in life expectancy would have closed by 2036. European life expectancy also stalled after 2014. Still, the comparison with Europe suggests that mortality rates of both Black and White Americans could fall much further across all ages and in both high-income and low-income areas.

Research on coresidence between parents and their adult children in the United States has challenged the myth that elders are the primary beneficiaries, instead showing that intergenerationally extended households generally benefit the younger generation more than their parents. Nevertheless, the economic fortunes of those at the older and younger ends of the adult life course have shifted in the second half of the twentieth century, with increasing financial well-being among older adults and greater financial strain among younger adults. This article uses U.S. census and American Community Survey (ACS) data to examine the extent to which changes in generational financial well-being over the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries have been reflected in the likelihood of coresidence and financial dependency in parent-adult child U.S. households between 1960 and 2010. We find that younger adults have become more financially dependent on their parents and that while older adults have become more financially independent of their adult children, they nevertheless coreside with their needy adult children. We also find that the effect of economic considerations in decisions about coresidence became increasingly salient for younger adults, but decreasingly so for older adults.

Financial education sans opportunities for hands-on experience and knowledge operationalization may be insufficient for promoting healthy financial behaviors. Financial capability combines financial education with financial inclusion via a savings account, thereby giving an opportunity translate knowledge into practice. This study used data from the 2012 National Financial Capability Study to examine relationships between the financial capability and financial behaviors of United States Millennials ( N  = 6865). Compared to their financially excluded peers, Millennials who were financially capable were 176 % more likely to afford unexpected expenses, 224 % more likely to save for emergencies, 21 % less likely to use alternative financial services, and 30 % less likely to carry burdensome debt. Interventions that focus solely on financial education or inclusion may be insufficient for facilitating Millennials’ healthy financial behaviors; interventions should instead develop financial capability.

Abstract Background Extreme income or asset loss as severe form of financial hardship (FH) has been linked to worse survival outcomes in cancer patients. This study aimed to assess the incidence, risk factors, and impact of severe financial hardship (SFH) on survival among working-age cancer patients in Taiwan’s universal healthcare system, using an objective measure for SFH. Methods This study analyzed linked national longitudinal data for patients aged 20-63 years diagnosed with cancer between 2007 and 2018. Severe financial hardship was defined as household net income falling below the poverty threshold post-diagnosis. Propensity score matching (1:4) was used to balance baseline characteristics between SFH and non-SFH groups. Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) of outcomes. Results Among 400 229 working-age cancer patients, the incidence of SFH was 4.7 per 1000 person-years (95% confidence interval [CI], 4.6-4.9) over a mean follow-up of 5.7 ± 4.3 years. Severe financial hardship was associated with younger age, male sex, advanced stage, and intensive treatments. Patients with SFH within 1 year of diagnosis had significantly lower survival, with an adjusted HR of 1.64 (95% CI, 1.56–1.72) for all-cause mortality compared to those without SFH. Notably, early stage patients with SFH faced a higher relative mortality risk than advanced-stage patients. Conclusions Severe financial hardship substantially increases mortality among cancer patients in Taiwan, highlighting gaps in financial protection. Addressing SFH through implementing targeted policies and enhancing support mechanisms is essential to improve survival outcomes and reduce disparities in cancer care.

In the United States, racial disparities in wealth are vast, yet their causes are only partially understood. In Being Black, Living in the Red, Conley (1999) argued that the sociodemographic traits of young blacks and their parents, particularly parental wealth, wholly explain their wealth disadvantage. Using data from the 1980—2009 waves of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, I show that this conclusion hinges on the specific sample considered and the treatment of debtors in the sample. I further document that prior research has paid insufficient attention to the possibility of variation in the association between wealth and race at different points of the net worth distribution. Among wealth holders, blacks remain significantly disadvantaged in assets compared with otherwise similar whites. Among debtors, however, young whites hold more debt than otherwise similar blacks. The results suggest that, among young adults, debt may reflect increased access to credit, not simply the absence of assets. The asset disadvantage for black net wealth holders also indicates that research and policy attention should not be focused only on young blacks \"living in the red.\"

We examined the prevalence of self-reported chronic conditions and out-of-pocket spending using the 2005 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) and made comparisons to previously published MEPS data. Our study found that the prevalence of self-reported chronic conditions is increasing among not only the old-old but also people in midlife and earlier old age. The greatest growth occurred in the number of people affected by multiple chronic diseases, a group with sizable out-of-pocket spending. Policymakers should be aware that cost sharing at the point of care can disproportionately burden people with chronic conditions and discourage adherence to drugs that prevent disease progression. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]

This study uses 1986-2012 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 cohort data to investigate the relationship between raising children and net worth among younger Baby Boomer parents. I combine fixed-effects and unconditional quantile regression models to estimate changes in net worth associated with having children in different age groups across the wealth distribution. This allows me to test whether standard economic models for savings and consumption over the life course hold for families at different wealth levels. My findings show that the wealth effects of children vary throughout the distribution. Among families at or below the median, children of all ages were associated with wealth declines, likely due to the costs of child-rearing. However, at the 75th percentile and above, wealth increased with the presence of younger children but decreased after those children reached age 18. My results, therefore, provide evidence for a saving and investment model of child-rearing among wealthier families but not among families at or below median wealth levels. For these families, the costs of raising children largely outweighed motivations for saving.