Publication Date

3-20-2020

Publisher

Social Policy Institute at Washington University in St. Louis

Summary

Much of the literature on household finances tends to focus on discrete or relatively objective measures like savings, debt, economic mobility, and there has been a lack of research on holistic measures of financial well-being. This gap is due in part to the absence of a common understanding of how to define and measure financial well-being; a gap that was recently addressed by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s development of a financial well-being scale. However, the research on this scale is still scarce and little is known about how financial well-being evolves over time. To that end, this paper uses a two-wave survey of low- and moderate-income tax filers to present the first longitudinal analysis of the CFPB’s financial well-being scale. Using a combination of descriptive analysis, OLS regression, and fixed effects panel regression, we assess (1) the stability of financial well-being over a six-month period; (2) the extent to which household characteristics predict volatility in financial well-being; and (3) the relationship between the experience of adverse financial events, including financial shocks and material hardships, and financial well-being. We find that financial well-being scores are extremely stable over the short-term, and that household characteristics are generally not strong predictors of financial well-being changes. We also find that, while adverse financial events like the loss of a job are significantly associated with declines in financial well-being, these changes are not large. These findings have implications for researchers and practitioners interested in using the financial well-being scale in program and policy evaluations.

Note: This study was supported in part by the JPMorgan Chase Foundation and the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

Document Type

Report or White Paper

Notes

This document is the unedited author’s version of a submitted work that was subsequently accepted for publication in Journal of Family and Economic Issues, copyright ©️ 2021 after peer review. To access the final edited and published work see https://doi.org/10.1007/s10834-021-09760-w

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.7936/cvrt-ss16

Project

Refund to Savings (R2S)

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