Swimming Against the Tide

An Analysis of Private Sector Development Issues in Small Economies This book examines the underlying factors that determine the environment for investment and growth in small economies, focussing on those in the Pacific.The private sector can flourish and create employment opportunities only if the environment in which it operates is conducive to business. Governments can often create an environment that increases the costs of doing business, reduces profits, and discourages dynamism and entrepreneurship. These issues include • fostering financial sector development for credit to be more readily available for business; • clarifying land rights and modifying them with respect to cultural preservation and the development of land markets; • reducing the role of the state in the economies of the region; • revamping the regulatory regimes for the business environment to be less constrained and monopolies more prudently regulated; • focusing on the assistance of small-scale rural enterprises. With concerted efforts, governments can ensure the resolution of these critical issues. However, doing so requires considerable time and great effort. Nevertheless, now is a perfect time to start the process. Strategies for change should focus on what causes the low rates of return on capital as well as the constraints to business startup and development.private sector development; institutional economics

When, Why, and How Do Mutual Fund Investors Use Financial Advisers?

More than four in 10 U.S. households own mutual funds and half of mutual fund–owning households indicate they have ongoing advisory relationships. Financial advisers provide a wide range of investment and planning services in addition to helping investors select and purchase mutual fund shares. Using a variety of household surveys, this chapter delves into when, why, and how mutual fund investors interact with financial advisers. For example, the research explores whether certain “trigger” events prompt fund investors to seek professional financial advice. Investors typically receive multiple services and choose to work with financial advisers because advisers have expertise in areas investors do not. In addition, investors interact with advisers in a variety of ways (e.g., collaboratively versus the adviser or investor taking the lead; investor conducting their own research). The chapter also analyzes whether certain mutual fund investors are more likely than others to work with financial advisers

The Role of Individual Retirement Accounts in US Retirement Planning

With the rising importance of individual retirement accounts (IRAs), which now total onequarter of US retirement assets, public policy has sharpened its focus on how individuals manage those accumulations through work and retirement years. Individuals are required to take distributions from their IRAs after age 70½, while distributions taken prior to age 59½ generally incur a 10 percent penalty. Previous research has found that IRA owners rarely tapped these assets prior to retirement; this chapter updates results and shows that these patterns continue. Several factors influence the probability of withdrawal (prior to 70½): being younger than 60 lowers the probability of a withdrawal, but being retired, in poor health, or having a home mortgage increases the likelihood of withdrawal

The Role of 401(k) Accumulations in Future Retirement Income

Defined contribution (DC) plans are increasingly being offered as the primary employer-sponsored pension, so it is of interest to ask whether DC accumulations are likely to yield sufficient income in retirement. This chapter uses the EBRI/ICI 401(k) Accumulation Projection Model to explore alternative future scenarios for retirees having had 401(k) plans available over a full working career. We assess the impact of catch-up contributions recently permitted by legislation; saving through individual retirement accounts if the employer does not offer a 401(k) plan; and changing the retirement age

Measurement Error and Farm Size: Do Nationally Representative Surveys Provide Reliable Estimates?

We assess the reliability of measured farm sizes (ownership holdings) in the Living Standard Measurement Study – Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) in Ethiopia and Malawi based on three survey rounds (2012, 2014, 2016) in Ethiopia and four rounds (2010, 2013, 2016, 2019) in Malawi. By using the balanced panel of households that participated in all the rounds, we utilized the within-household variation in reported and measured ownership holdings that, to a large extent, were measured with GPSs and/or with rope and compass. While this gives reliable measures of reported holdings, we detect substantial under-reporting of parcels over time within households. We find that the estimated farm sizes within survey rounds are substantially downward biased due to systematic and stochastic under-reporting of parcels. Such biases are substantial in the data from both countries, in all survey rounds, and in all regions of each country. Based on the analyses, we propose that the maximum within-household reported farm sizes over several survey rounds provide a more reliable proxy for the actual farm size distributions, as these maximum sizes are less likely to be biased due to parcel attrition. The ignorance of this non-classical measurement error is associated with a downward bias in the range of 20-30% in average and median farm sizes and an upward bias in the Gini-coefficients for farm size distributions. We propose ideas for follow-up research and improvements in collecting these data types and draw some policy implications

Qualified Retirement Plans: Analysis of Distribution and Rollover Activity

One potential downside when employees have the freedom to manage their own retirement accumulations is “leakage” prior to the end of their working careers, which is proxied here using age 60. Leakage occurs when employees take withdrawals prior to retirement, when they cash out distributions at job separation, or when they fail to pay back loans taken out against their accounts. Although leakage has the potential to undermine a participant-driven retirement system, trend analysis shows that aggregate pre-retirement leakage is modest and trending down relative to assets, and stable as a share of gross contributions. The probability of receiving a distribution and the fraction of gross distributions cashed out are roughly equal across income groups, but the portion cashed out represents a higher percentage of income for the lower-income groups

Swimming Against the Tide

An Analysis of Private Sector Development Issues in Small Economies This book examines the underlying factors that determine the environment for investment and growth in small economies, focussing on those in the Pacific.The private sector can flourish and create employment opportunities only if the environment in which it operates is conducive to business. Governments can often create an environment that increases the costs of doing business, reduces profits, and discourages dynamism and entrepreneurship. These issues include • fostering financial sector development for credit to be more readily available for business; • clarifying land rights and modifying them with respect to cultural preservation and the development of land markets; • reducing the role of the state in the economies of the region; • revamping the regulatory regimes for the business environment to be less constrained and monopolies more prudently regulated; • focusing on the assistance of small-scale rural enterprises. With concerted efforts, governments can ensure the resolution of these critical issues. However, doing so requires considerable time and great effort. Nevertheless, now is a perfect time to start the process. Strategies for change should focus on what causes the low rates of return on capital as well as the constraints to business startup and development

Knowledge, beliefs, perceptions, and behavior related to the corona (COVID-19) pandemic among university students in Malawi

This study is based on a survey of 764 students at the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR), Lilongwe, Malawi. It aims to provide evidence on the extent of exposure to the pandemic among university students, their knowledge and beliefs related to the corona virus and the ways they protect themselves against getting infected, the sources of information that they rely on, and other factors influencing their knowledge, beliefs, and behavior. The study was undertaken in the period of February-March 2022 during which the fourth wave of the pandemic in the country took place and in this period the omicron variant of the virus dominated. We investigate factors associated with the extent of knowledge about the corona virus and COVID risk perceptions, information updating behavior, preferences for alternative protective measures, especially vaccination and use of facemasks. We also assessed beliefs about the effects of vaccination, trust in vaccines, and passive and active demand for vaccination. Finally, we investigate facemask use intensity and factors influencing the likelihood of infection and COVID-19 disease based on subjective self-reported experiences