How Low-Income Households Save—And Can We Help?
Watch the event recording here.
Savings has traditionally been measured by asking about “account” balances, or in national accounts by comparing incomes to expenditures. But we know that low-income households often save actively. They build up and draw down their funds throughout the year—what Nobel Laureate Angus Deaton termed “high frequency savings”—even if their balances don’t grow.
Short-term savings are a key part of the financial lives of low-income households in the US and in developing countries; the challenges they face in building up and effectively using their savings are quite similar as well.
This edition of faiVLive—co-presented with the Aspen Institute Financial Security Program—brings together researchers and practitioners to look at how short-term savings work and don’t work, with a particular eye to whether and how savings for low-income households can be boosted.
#AspenFSPLive #faiVLive
Moderator:
Timothy Ogden, Managing Director, FAI
Featuring:
Jessica Goldberg, University of Maryland
Jonathan Lee, Neighborhood Trust Financial Partners
Genevieve Melford, Aspen Institute Financial Security Program
Jonathan Morduch, New York University and FAI
Suggested reading:
The Cycle of Savings: What We Gain When We Understand Savings as a Dynamic Process
The Great Convergence: Toward a Global Strategy for Financial Inclusion
Savings Horizons: U.S. Financial Diaries Issue Brief
Supported by the Mastercard Impact Fund, in collaboration with Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth.