Lifestyle conformity and lifecycle saving: a Veblenian perspective
基于凡勃伦思想，提出生活方式趋同是生命周期储蓄的替代解释，认为人们随年龄按社会群体规范调整生活方式，从而通过习惯思维实现储蓄，并提供了实证证据。
Since the 1950s, the lifecycle hypothesis has been the dominant explanation for the 'inverse U' in household wealth accumulation. This paper advances an alternative explanation, rooted in the ideas of Veblen, that emphasises the role of lifestyle conformity: Because people tend to adopt lifestyles common to their social group and modify them in standard ways as they age, lifecycle norms impart a certain order to the accumulation of assets and liabilities, which enables people to 'do' lifecycle saving via habitual thinking. After laying out the argument conceptually, the paper provides empirical evidence on the role of conformity in lifecycle saving and discusses its contribution to the current low saving rate in the USA. Copyright The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. All rights reserved., Oxford University Press.