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November 21, 2010

Older but Not Wiser? The Psychology Behind Seniors' Susceptibility to Scams: Scientific American

Older but Not Wiser? The Psychology Behind Seniors' Susceptibility to Scams: Scientific American

Economists have studied how aging impacts real-life financial behavior. Harvard University economist David Laibson and his colleagues looked at a variety of choices people make about loans and credit cards, in a study in 2009. They found that people on the younger and older ends of the age spectrum ended up making more mistakes—that is, decisions that cost them money—than did middle-aged people. For home equity loans, for instance, 25-year-olds and 80-year-olds had loans with annual percentage rates of about 6 percent; 50-year-olds had rates of 5.5 percent. On average, across the different types of choices, people made the fewest mistakes at age 53.

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