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Consumer Expenditures and Home Production at Retirement - New Evidence from Germany

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  • Melanie Lührmann

    (Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA))

Abstract

This paper investigates consumer expenditures of German households pre- and post-retirement. The widely observed distinct drop in spending upon retirement entry poses an empirical puzzle since life cycle theory predicts smoothing of the marginal utility of consumption over time. As one explanation, I explore the role of home production as a substitute for consumer expenses. Taking a combined look at consumer expenditures and time use pre and post-retirement, I find a significant drop of about 17% of pre-retirement expenses at retirement which coincides with an increase in time spent on home production of an additional 33% per day.

Suggested Citation

  • Melanie Lührmann, 2007. "Consumer Expenditures and Home Production at Retirement - New Evidence from Germany," MEA discussion paper series 07120, Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA) at the Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy.
    • Handle: RePEc:mea:meawpa:07120
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    Cited by:

    1. Nivorozhkina, Ludmila & Nivorozhkin, Anton & Abazieva, Kamilla, 2010. "Drop in consumption associated with retirement. The regression discontinuity design approach," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 19(3), pages 112-126.
    2. Martin Browning & Thomas F. Crossley & Melanie Lührmann, 2016. "Durable Purchases over the Later Life Cycle," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 78(2), pages 145-169, April.
    3. Drescher, Larissa S. & Roosen, Jutta, 2013. "A Cohort Analysis of Food-at-Home and Food-away-from-Home Expenditures in Germany," German Journal of Agricultural Economics, Humboldt-Universitaet zu Berlin, Department for Agricultural Economics, vol. 62(01), pages 1-13, February.
    4. Miriam Beblo & Sven Schreiber, 2022. "Leisure and housing consumption after retirement: new evidence on the life-cycle hypothesis," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 305-330, March.
    5. Zarul Khaliff Kamal* & Siti Mardhiah Isa & Ros Idayuwati Alaudin & Noriszura Ismail, 2018. "Adequacy of Retirement Wealth in Malaysia: Spending Behaviour Analysis," The Journal of Social Sciences Research, Academic Research Publishing Group, pages 429-435:6.
    6. Miriam Beblo & Sven Schreiber, 2010. "The Life-Cycle Hypothesis Revisited: Evidence on Housing Consumption after Retirement," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 339, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    7. Jia Qi & Swarn Chatterjee & Yingyi Liu, 2022. "Retirement Preparedness of Generation X Compared to Other Cohorts in the United States," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-14, June.
    8. Velarde, Melanie & Herrmann, Roland, 2014. "Time use for consumption and household production of food: is there a retirement-consumption puzzle in Germany?," 2014 International Congress, August 26-29, 2014, Ljubljana, Slovenia 182829, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    9. Hamermesh, Daniel S. & Myck, Michal & Oczkowska, Monika, 2021. "Widows' Time, Time Stress and Happiness: Adjusting to Loss," IZA Discussion Papers 14343, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Velarde, Melanie & Herrmann, Roland, 2014. "How retirement changes consumption and household production of food: Lessons from German time-use data," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 3(C), pages 1-10.
    11. Anton Nivorozhkin & Ludmila Nivorozhkina & Kamila Abazieva, 2013. "Expenditures and Income Adequacy at Retirement," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 33(3), pages 2017-2023.
    12. Drescher, Larissa S. & Roosen, Jutta, 2013. "A Cohort Analysis of Food-at-Home and Food-away-from-Home Expenditures in Germany," Journal of International Agricultural Trade and Development, Journal of International Agricultural Trade and Development, vol. 62(1).

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

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