A Comparison of National Saving Rates in the UK, US and Italy

Abstract

We develop the approach of Gokhale et al. (1996), based on the life-cycle model of savings, to decompose the di?erences in the national saving rates between the UK, US and Italy. Our work suggests that the US saving rate is lower principally because Americans on average retire later. In contrast, the Italian saving rate is higher predominantly because Italians are credit constrained, particularly when young. We also found that demography and the di?erent tax and bene?t systems are able to explain little of the cross-sectional di?erences in saving rates. The study accounts for the possible importance of intergenerational private transfers in determining saving rates.Saving Rates, International Comparisons, Intergenerational Transfers, Borrowing Constraints