TY  - JOUR
AU  - Stephens,Melvin, Jr.
AU  - Unayama,Takashi
TI  - The Consumption Response to Seasonal Income: Evidence from Japanese Public Pension Benefits
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 16342
PY  - 2010
Y2  - September 2010
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16342
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16342.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Melvin Stephens, Jr.
University of Michigan
Department of Economics
341 Lorch Hall
611 Tappan St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1220
Tel: 734/647-5606
E-Mail: mstep@umich.edu

Takashi Unayama
Department of Economics
Kobe University
Rokko-dai cho 2-1, Nada-ku
KOBE, 657-8501
Japan
E-Mail: unayama@person.kobe-u.ac.jp
AB  - Japanese public pension benefits, which were distributed quarterly through February 1990 and every other month since then, induce substantial but predictable income fluctuations. The relative magnitude of the payments combined with the delay between payments yields a stronger test of the Life-Cycle/Permanent Income Hypothesis than in prior studies. Applying two identification strategies to monthly household panel data, we find that consumption significantly responds to quarterly benefit receipt. Additional analysis suggests that our findings cannot be explained by either liquidity constraints or precautionary savings motives.
ER  -