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The purpose of this study is to find out the effect of consumption tax on savings behavior especially on the people who are close to their retirement.

The authors analyze the response in spending and retirement saving using a difference-in-differences regression methodology. The authors use the year since the Public Provident Fund (PPF) enrollment date for each individual as a random assignment to identify the service tax policy's causal impact. Therefore, this variable is a continuous variable defined as an individual's age until the end of the restrictions when people can withdraw money from their retirement savings account PPF without any penalty. The treatment variable is the service tax shock (increase in service tax) that happened effective 1st April 2015.

The authors find a significant effect of a change in the service tax rate on individuals' spending and PPF saving behavior. On average, individuals lower their consumption by about 14% and increase their PPF savings by 16% in response to the increase in the service tax rate. The authors find substantial heterogeneity in effect across different types of individuals. The effect is more pronounced for people closer to their retirement and needy people (defined as individuals with low traditional savings account balances).

The authors studied the effect of consumption tax on one category of savings (PPF) only. There are other savings instruments available in India. The data for those were not available to us.

This paper not only throws light on the consumption and savings behaviour of the individuals, but will also help the policy maker for framing appropriate fiscal policy.

Using a unique and proprietary data from a large bank in India, the authors analyze the effect of a tax policy change on households' consumption and retirement savings behavior. The authors find that households reduce their consumption by 14% and increase their voluntary retirement savings (Public Provident Fund aka PPF) by 16% in response to an increase in the service tax policy. Individuals close to their retirement age (55 years of age and above) and without any withdrawal restrictions from their PPF account tend to reduce their expenditures more and save more. Individuals with financial constraints and withdrawal restrictions do not reduce their expenditures significantly. To the best of the authors’ knowledge no study was done on this.

Introduction: The Republic of Moldova’s economy faces risks caused by the war in Ukraine and the economic crisis, proving that citizens’ prosperity is essential for national stability and that financial knowledge influences the standard of living. A minimum financial education provides information, knowledge, and tools to make correct decisions based on informed consent in an increasingly complex financial system. In the financial-banking and academic environment, in-depth research of consumers’ financial education level helps to optimise, streamline, and balance bank–client relations with fairness. This work is the consequence of studying the level of financial education among consumers of financial-banking services, with direct implications for their financial well-being.

Purpose: The main aim of this research is to measure the financial knowledge of consumers of financial-banking services, developing recommendations for measures to improve the situation.

Methodology: To explain the factors of influence, the following research techniques were used: analysis and synthesis of conceptual approaches to financial education; deduction and induction; analysis of the findings of sociological research on the level of financial education of users of financial-banking services; and recommendation synthesis.

Findings: The research validates that enhancing financial education has a positive effect on individuals and the economy, reinstates confidence in financial markets, makes an innovative contribution to accurately assessing consumers’ financial knowledge enabling the implementation of proactive measures.

Implications: This chapter provides insights into consumers’ financial education level, serving as a crucial indicator for institutions and public authorities in formulating and promoting effective educational initiatives to ensure minimal skill gaps.

The study aims to explore the savings behaviour of Indian farmers. An attempt is also made to inspect the effect of financial literacy (FL) and financial confidence (FC) on the savings behaviour of the farmers in India.

This study used secondary data on 10,263 Indian farmers from Financial Inclusion Insights, 2017 database. Relevant statistical techniques and ordered probit regression were used to unfold the effect of FL and FC on the savings behaviour of farmers.

The outcome of the study revealed that the majority of the Indian farmers exhibited poor levels of FL and FC. Of the total, 42.99% were found to save regularly. FL and FC were observed to play instrumental roles in steering the savings behaviour of the Indian farmers. Household size, financial shocks, gender, farm ownership, income, household financial decision-making process, religion and educational attainment have emerged to be significant predictors of the savings behaviour of Indian farmers.

The present study makes an original contribution to the extant literature by unfolding the savings behaviour of Indian farmers and the effect of FL and FC on such behaviour using a rich sample of 10,263 farmers for the first time.

The objective of this systematic literature review (SLR) is to explore the current state of research in the field of household finance (HF). This study aims to summarize the existing research to highlight the importance of household finance in a nation’s economy. By exploring all conceptual and applied implications of HF, this study projects directions for future research to develop a comprehensive understanding of the subject.

This SLR is based on 112 articles published in peer-reviewed journals between 2006 and 2020 (Table 3). The methodology comprises five steps, namely, formulation of research questions, identification of studies, their selection and evaluation, analyses and syntheses and presentation of results.

The findings of this study show that studies on HF are gradually increasing worldwide with the USA registering the highest number of published research on the topic during the period under scrutiny. Notwithstanding the increasing attention and research on HF, empirical research in emerging economies is lagging. Additionally, this study finds that HF structure presents a perfect setting to understand how households compose their financial portfolio, make financial decisions and what factors influence their decisions.

This study is an SLR – an accurate and accepted method of reviewing available literature on a selected subject. However, the selection of inclusion and exclusion criteria depends on the researchers’ rationale which might lead to research bias. This should be considered an inherent limitation of SLR.

By synthesizing the contents of extant literature, this study presents important insights into HF. This study underlines the most discussed topics in the domain and identifies potential investigation areas. This study gives the knowledge of leading articles, authors and journals and informs scholars and academicians about the areas that need further investigation by portraying the complete picture of the subject in a systematic manner. Further, this study highlights that households make suboptimal financial decisions that affect their financial well-being. To reduce the adverse impacts of these decisions, policymakers and financial institutions must take steps to improve households’ use of formal financial markets. Household decisions can be reformed by enhancing consumers’ knowledge about financial products and services. Furthermore, households can be served better by offering customization in traditional financial products.

This study synthesizes the main findings of selected literature on HF. The expansion of studies on HF has generated the need to review the existing literature in a systematic manner. To the researchers’ best knowledge, this SLR is the first thorough study of available articles in the HF domain. This study presents the scope of future research by highlighting numerous aspects and functions of HF.

We study the potential effects of pension underfunding on corporate investment, financial constraints and improved employee bonding using 10 Pacific-Basin countries (including the United States, Australia, and eight Asian countries) at heterogeneous economic development stages and different regulatory environments. We document that corporate pensions are significantly underfunded in most countries of our sample in the period of 2001–2017, when interest rates were ultralow in most countries. In addition, firms from countries with stronger employee protection and more generous retirement benefits tend to show higher levels of underfunding in their defined benefit (DB) pension plans. To the extent of pension underfunding imposing constraints on corporate investment, we find that firms in these countries can face more constraints on investment when their pension is underfunded.

Using the integrated behavioural model (IBM) as a theoretical framework, this study aims to identify the determinants of saving behaviour among Malaysia's income-earning Generation Y (Gen Y) born in the years 1980–1995.

The study was conducted using a questionnaire survey targeting Gen Y respondents 500 sets of responses were obtained via convenience sampling method.

Analysis conducted using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) revealed that there were positive relationships among instrumental attitude, injunctive norm, perceived control, self-efficacy and intention to save. Secondly, intention to save, financial literacy and time preference were found to positively influence saving behaviour.

Policymakers may find this study useful as the results reveal saving behaviour determinants of Gen Ys in Malaysia, and policies could then be formulated to improve Gen Y's saving behaviour.

This study contributes to the literature by applying the IBM to a study on saving behaviour.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-05-2023-0340

Retiring from work used to signify the end of paid employment and a transition to focus on life outside the workplace. From this perspective, the work-life interface may have no relevance for the retired. However, recent changes, particularly resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, suggest that conceptualizations of both retirement and the work-life interface are more fluid, ambiguous, and complex. In this chapter, we first set the scene, reviewing how and why the traditional concept of retirement has changed so dramatically. Drawing on empirical data from contemporary media, we then consider how the current experience of the older worker and retiree are being reframed in neoliberal terms, emphasizing individual responsibility to remain not just fit and healthy but also productive, through a wide range of activities. We then focus on the impact of COVID-19, highlighting how pre-pandemic structural inequalities have been exacerbated, resulting in a range of responses in both levels of retirement and work by older people. We conclude by suggesting that retirement and its work-life interface need to recognize lived experience as dynamic, messy, and varied and implicated in wider structural features of both the economy and society.

This study aims to investigate the main drivers of private saving in Egypt (2005–2020).

It employs an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach for quarterly data on private saving, lagged private saving, real gross domestic product (GDP) growth, public saving, inflation, real interest rate, money supply, current account deficit and unemployment.

Private saving in Egypt displays persistency and public saving depresses private saving in the short run and long run. Real interest rate, inflation and unemployment have negative and statistically significant impacts on private saving in the short run and long run. The current account deficit displays a negative effect on private saving but is significant only in the short run. Other incorporated variables, like real GDP and money supply, are not statistically significant. This could be attributed to the high consumption rather than saving motive of the Egyptian population and their tendency to rely more on other informal saving channels.

Findings are of policy relevance as unleashing the determinants of private saving guides policymakers in formulating the appropriate sustainable development policies. It also assists in identifying the main obstacles hindering the promotion of private saving and hence major areas for policy intervention, like financial inclusion, poverty eradication, employment generation and structural reforms.

This study contributes to the literature: (1) it tackles private saving figure rather than aggregate saving figure that is covered by similar studies due to lack of consistent data, (2) given the relatively low quality, unavailability and inconsistency of data on private saving in developing countries, investigating the determinants of private saving should be carried out on an individual country basis which is done by this study, (3) this study fulfills the gap in literature related to the lack of up-to-date studies on private saving in Egypt and (4) it relies on quarterly data that could produce more reliable results.

Micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) are the backbone of economic development for every economy. They contribute to local economic development through household wealth creation, employment generation and poverty reduction. Despite this pivotal role, MSMEs lack access to finance, and scholarship on the enabling role of financial inclusion on micro, small and medium-sized enterprises' performance is scant. The authors contribute to closing the knowledge gap by examining the enabling effect of financial inclusion on MSMEs using the FinScope MSME 2017 survey for the Kingdom of Eswatini. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned objective.

The study used the re-centered influence function regression framework to estimate unconditional quantile regressions and the generalized ordered logit model to analyze the data.

The findings from the unconditional quantile regression revealed that small changes in access to bank accounts, saving for business, formal saving, stokvel and informal saving at the 50th and 75th percentiles have a positive and statistically significant effect on microenterprises' annual turnover profit. Conversely, small changes in formal insurance have a mixed effect on annual turnover profit. At the 10th and 25th percentiles, a small increment in insurance reduces annual turnover profit but increases microenterprise annual turnover profit at the 75th percentile. Meanwhile, the evidence from the generalized ordered logit model showed that financial inclusion reduces the likelihood of microenterprises being classified as least developed and increased the chances of microenterprises falling into emerging and developed business categories.

This study makes use of a cross-sectional survey dataset, as a result, it does not infer causal relationships over the long term, but rather an association between the independent and dependent variables.

Overall, formal and informal financial inclusion enhances the annual turnover profit for microenterprises, particularly at the 50th and 75th percentiles in the Kingdom of Eswatini. The authors recommend a specialized institution such as a micro, small and medium-sized partial credit guarantee scheme to improve the quality and affordability of credit for microenterprises, and a mix of financial and non-financial supports depending on the development stage to boost a sustainable microenterprises' sector.

The study uses two advanced cross-sectional techniques, the recentered influence function framework and the generalized ordered logit model to analyze the data. The paper is original and contributes to the discussion of the role of financial inclusion in enabling microenterprises' success in Africa, using the FinScope 2017 survey of microenterprises in Eswatini as a case study.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-10-2020-0689.

The United States is unique in how it imposes income taxation on their citizens living overseas, as if they lived in the United States. Neither US residents (regardless of citizenship) nor non-US citizens residing overseas are subjected to such a penalising system. The system is justified by the stigmatisation of overseas Americans as necessarily wealthy and whose purpose in living overseas is to avoid US taxation.

Because of penalising US taxation, overseas Americans struggle with ordinary activities required to sustain modern life. The activities include owning a home, holding a bank account, investing and planning for retirement, operating a business, holding certain jobs, and pursuing community service opportunities. The situation causes many to feel that they have no choice but to renounce US citizenship.

Ultimately, the question must be asked: Are Americans free to live outside the United States?