This study examines who uses Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) in the United States and why, distinguishing constraint-driven use from convenience-driven adoption. Using the 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances with repeated-imputation inference and replicate weights (4,595 households; 22,975 observations), we estimate survey-weighted binary-choice models of BNPL participation (7% prevalence). The central construct is Objective Financial Well-Being (FWB), defined by three thresholds: at least 2.5 months of liquid assets, at least 50% of assets in investments, and a solvency ratio above one. Explanatory blocks include other installment debt, missed credit-card payments, liquidity slack, financial sophistication, risk tolerance, use of financial advice, and socioeconomic controls. We predict lower BNPL uptake among high-FWB households and higher uptake among those with other loans, missed card payments, and greater liquidity slack; we also expect a positive association with financial knowledge. Findings will inform policy (targeted disclosures and affordability checks), product design, and financial education by clarifying whether BNPL primarily serves financially constrained households or also functions as a budgeting tool for resilient consumers. Before the conference, we plan a cross-survey comparison using the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED) to link BNPL use to subjective financial well-being.
Author(s): Patrick Tito Buah-Bassuah, Vikesh Kumar, Theophilus Amanfo
Using nationally representative SHED 2022–2024 data, this study examines how unmet health needs, medical financial stress, and caregiving burdens shape insurance coverage and subjective financial well-being. Survey-weighted logistic models show that unmet needs are associated with higher odds of being uninsured, medical stress substantially lowers the probability of feeling better off than one year ago, and caregiving burdens markedly reduce the likelihood of reporting that the household is at least managing okay. Effects are graded and robust across specifications, amplified among low-income households and middle-aged and older adults, and partly buffered by dual coverage. Framed by Conservation of Resources theory, the results depict compounding loss spirals across access to care, liquidity, and time. The findings provide a pre-policy baseline relevant to current debates over Medicaid eligibility, caregiver supports, and medical-debt protections, and they offer concrete practice guidance on screening for clustered vulnerabilities that erode both structural security and perceived financial resilience.
This study examines how Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) usage relates to household financial well-being using the 2024 National Financial Capability Study. Financial well-being is measured multidimensionally via subjective financial satisfaction, the CFPB Financial Well-Being Scale, and self-reported financial stress. BNPL is a binary indicator of use in the past 12 months. OLS models with state fixed effects control for demographics, socioeconomic status, and objective and subjective financial knowledge. Subsample analyses (by financial knowledge and age) and propensity score matching corroborate the main results. Across specifications, BNPL use is associated with lower financial satisfaction, lower CFPB scores, and higher financial stress. Findings position BNPL as a potential marker of financial vulnerability and underscore the need for targeted education and policy measures while calling for longitudinal and qualitative research to clarify mechanisms and causality.
This study utilized the data from the 2024 National Financial Capacity Study to explore the dynamic changes in an individual's savings behavior when facing both long-term and short-term savings goals simultaneously. The results show that the interaction between college education savings and emergency savings significantly increases the probability of regular contributions to retirement accounts, but neither alone has a significant impact on retirement contribution behavior. The research further explored the related factors of retirement planning behavior and found that regardless of the type of savings held, it would prompt individuals to be more inclined to think about the amount needed for retirement. Furthermore, comparing the results of the two models indicates that young people are more likely than older people to make regular contributions to their retirement accounts, but they are less likely to plan the amount needed for retirement. The responsibility of supporting parents has no impact on regular contribution behavior, but it increases the possibility of making retirement savings plans. The results of this study provide inspiration and direction for financial advisors, scholars, and future research.
This study examines the impact of borrowing from and cashing out of retirement accounts on the perception of retirement preparedness among the working population in the United States. Grounded in the Theory of Planned Behavior, our research explores how attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control influence these financial behaviors and their subsequent effect on retirement confidence. We used logistic regression to analyse the 2023 Survey of Household Economics and Decision-making (SHED) data. We found that cashing out retirement savings significantly diminishes the perception of retirement preparedness, whereas borrowing does not exhibit a similar effect. Key determinants, such as health status, income, education level, and availability of emergency funds, significantly influence perceived retirement readiness. These findings underscore the critical need for financial literacy and strategic retirement planning to mitigate the adverse effects of early withdrawal behaviors on long-term financial security.
This study aims to examine the association between financial literacy, measured by objective and subjective financial literacy, and financial self-efficacy. The study also uses financial education mandates as an instrumental variable to examine the causal effect of financial literacy on financial self-efficacy. Hence, the study employs an instrumental variable approach to address endogeneity, using financial education requirements as the instrument. Utilizing data from the U.S. 2018 National Financial Capability Study, the study applies two-stage regressions and performs sensitivity analyses for White and non-White subsamples. The first-stage regression results indicate that financial education requirements are positively associated with higher levels of both objective and subjective financial literacy. The second-stage probit results uncover that objective and subjective financial literacy have a positive causal effect on financial self-efficacy. The sensitivity analyses across White and non-White subsamples yield consistent findings, emphasizing the important role of both objective and subjective financial literacy in fostering financial self-efficacy in the United States.
Author(s): Thomas Korankye, Ichchha Pandey, Ferdous Ahmmed
Recent research has shown financial self-efficacy (FSE) to be a characteristic associated with financial outcomes that can be increased via interventions (Asebedo et al., 2019). However, there are few studies that examine gender differences within FSE or how such gendered differences relate to financial outcomes (Furrebøe & Nyhus, 2022). Using interaction effects and Blinder-Oaxaca decompositions the current study provides evidence for specific gender differences within individual financial self-efficacy, related financial behaviors, and resulting financial outcomes. Results indicate that increased financial self-efficacy improved women’s financial well-being faster than men, and that over 70% of the gender gap in objective financial outcomes could be reduced by equalizing women’s financial self-efficacy and objective and subjective financial literacy. These findings suggest that interventions designed to improve the economic well-being of women should focus on improving women’s financial self-efficacy and financial knowledge.
This study investigates perception-bias in financial knowledge, defined as the misalignment between subjective and objective financial knowledge, and evaluates how state-level mandates for high school economics and personal finance education shape this bias. Using pooled data from the 2009–2021 National Financial Capability Study merged with the Council for Economic Education’s Survey of the States, the analysis applies a two-stage residual-based approach to quantify over- and underconfidence. Results show that while implementing economics courses is associated with greater underconfidence, rigorous economics standards and personal finance mandates significantly reduce perception-bias. However, heightened rigor in financial education requirements yields no measurable effect, and for young adults (ages 18–24), rigorous economics mandates may even increase underconfidence. These findings suggest that curriculum design and rigor influence not only knowledge levels but also the accuracy of self-assessment. The study highlights implications for educators, policymakers, and researchers by showing how educational mandates affect confidence calibration in financial literacy, a factor critical for informed consumer behavior and household economic well-being.
This study examines the effect of livelihood benefits on household consumption in South Korea. Government support is provided as cash. Using data from the Korean Welfare Panel, the analysis compares the effect of adjusted gross income and livelihood benefits on food and non-food expenditures. Measures of elasticity, average propensity to consume (APC), and marginal propensity to consume (MPC) are applied. Results indicate food spending is unresponsive to either income source. Non-food expenditures increase; a larger increase is observed from livelihood benefits. The findings establish that households do not differentiate between livelihood benefits and other income sources. Cash transfers contribute to overall welfare but do not directly achieve the policy objective of increasing food expenditure.
Licensed payday lender operations have declined nearly 90% over the past decade in Wisconsin, even in absence of interest rate limits and relatively high limits on the maximum amount one can borrow in payday loans. Yet, Wisconsin has relatively generous income limits for food and energy assistance sans any limit limits. Considering that utilities are a common reason consumers borrow payday loans, I examine the effects of payday lender vacancy on energy assistance participation by leveraging cross-county variation in licensed payday lender vacancies by year. I employ unique administrative data on licensed payday lender branch operations in Wisconsin since 2011, which I merge to publicly available administrative data on counties’ energy assistance participation, demographics, socioeconomic characteristics, and business censuses. I preliminarily find that licensed payday lender vacancies increase energy assistance participation, although such effects are delayed. Results have policy implications for financial regulations conditional on statically generous safety net parameters.
Assistant Professor, University of Wisconsin-Madison
I am a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for Research on Poverty and an incoming assistant professor in the Department of Consumer Science (effective Fall 2020), both at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I study the impacts of consumer policies on economically vulnerable populations... Read More →
Tuesday April 14, 2026 10:15am - 11:45am PDT Pacific II
The Individual Financial Access Scale (IFAS) development project represents a comprehensive three-year initiative to create the first validated, multidimensional measurement tool for financial access. Moving beyond traditional binary measures of basic product ownership, this study employed rigorous scale development methodology following established psychometric procedures across three distinct phases: conceptualization and item generation, pilot testing with 1,085 respondents, and validation with 4,094 nationally representative participants. The project utilized both Confirmatory Factor Analysis and Item Response Theory to develop two validated scale versions—a comprehensive 14-item and parsimonious 10-item tool—that capture financial access across three empirically-derived domains: Mainstream Financial Products and Services (focusing on wealth-building products), Institutional Practices of Financial Service Providers, and Individual Ability and Actions. Both versions demonstrated exceptional psychometric properties, with the 10-item scale achieving superior model fit (RMSEA=0.032, CFI=0.994, TLI=0.992). The scales employ sophisticated measurement approaches that assess not only product ownership but also availability, suitability, and perceived barriers to financial services. Standardized scoring tables enable conversion of raw scores to 0-30 point scales across domains, facilitating practical implementation by researchers, practitioners, and policymakers. This work provides essential infrastructure for understanding and addressing financial access disparities, supporting evidence-based interventions that can improve consumer financial outcomes
Author(s): Jin Huang, Julie Birkenmaier, Yingying Zhang
Budgeting is widely recognized as supporting financial well-being; however, limited research examines how individuals budget. This study investigates the information sources used for expense tracking and their relationship to budget data quality, using the 2023 Survey and Diary of Consumer Payment Choice. Descriptive analysis reveals that 65% of individuals rely on multiple information sources, with financial records being the most common source. Regression analyses show that employing multiple information sources significantly enhances budget data quality, measured as reductions in imprecise and incomplete expenditure reporting. Although 97% of respondents own financial accounts, only 66% rely on financial records when budgeting. Results show that financial record use depends on account ownership, ability to use accounts, and account service perceptions, supporting Birkenmaier and Huang's (2024) conceptualization of financial access. These findings suggest that financial education should emphasize multi-source budgeting strategies while addressing both objective and subjective barriers to financial access.
I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Consumer Sciences at The University of Alabama. I am also a faculty affiliate of the Center for Financial Security at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
My research focuses on three key areas: how youth and young adults develop financial capability; the role of safety net programs in promoting financial health; and the financial behavior of people with disabilities. I have published in the Journal of Family Economic Issues. My... Read More →
Tuesday April 14, 2026 10:15am - 11:45am PDT Atlantic I & II
Financial inclusion — access to and use of mainstream financial services — remains unequally distributed across the United States population, yet the mechanisms underlying these disparities are poorly understood at the intersectional level. This study examines how race, gender, and objective financial knowledge (OFK) jointly shape financial inclusion outcomes using data from a nationally representative sample of 24,918 U.S. adults. Employing a weighted multinomial logistic regression model with Gender × Race and Gender × Race × OFK interaction terms, we compute average marginal effects (AMEs) via counterfactual prediction to estimate the probability of four financial inclusion outcomes: exclusive institutional finance use, dual use of institutional and alternative financial services, alternative financial services only, and complete financial exclusion.
