Search

Farmers as individual financial decision-makers can be better identified as those under the greater responsibility of managing multi-faceted stressful situations in both family and farm management. With using 1044 random sampling survey method, this study investigates how financial stress, financial risk tolerance, locus of control, and financial self-efficacy are associated with the life satisfaction of farmers. By investigating the farmer's financial stress and finance-related psychological factors on their life satisfaction, this study has a purpose to inform financial services professionals, such as financial planners and advisors, of how to better serve a population in the farmland industries. Our findings showed that: (a)_ financial stress decreases the life satisfaction, but farmers show lower maringal effect than the non-farmers; (b) locus of control increases the life satisfaction, but the farmers show smaller marginal effect than non-farmers, and (c) demographic factors show different maringal effects among non-famrers and farmers (i.e., age, education, gender). Overall, identification of themselves as a farmer eased the negative relationship between financial stress and life satisfaction but reduced the positive relationship between locus of control and life satisfaction.

Though there is a huge literature on the demand for life insurance, it heavily focuses on demographic and economic factors. This study fills the gap in the current literature by incorporating psychological factor such as an experiencing a death in family members. The goal of this paper is to investigate the effect of death experience on life insurance ownership. Using a data from National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, we find evidence that there is positive association between a death experience and life insurance demand. Also, the model is better explained when both situational and dispositional factors are jointly examined.

The personal finance literature has documented the positive effects of financial knowledge, financial management, and financial self-efficacy on the lives of college students. However, there is a need for a more nuanced examination of how these factors shape financial decision making among African American college students. Using data obtained from the 2014 National Student Financial Wellness Study and structural equation modeling, results indicated that financial knowledge is not directly or indirectly associated with financial self-efficacy for African American students. Only financial management is significantly associated with increased financial self-efficacy. Findings indicate that financial education based on experiential learning may be effective for the well-being of African American students. Further, as the personal finance profession seeks to increase diversity in the field, experiential learning may be the vehicle to attract more African American professionals pursuing financial counseling, planning, and education professions in the future.

The purpose of the study described in this paper was to shed light on the need for alternative methods to improve descriptions and predictions of household financial ratios. Using data from the 2013, 2015, and 2017 Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), this study examined the descriptive and predictive power of an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) model and an Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) model when evaluating household savings-to-income ratios and debt-to-asset ratios cross-sectionally and across time. Results suggest that ANN models provide a better overall model fit when describing and forecasting financial ratios. Findings confirm that machine learning procedures can provide a robust, efficient, and effective analytic method when an educator, researcher, financial service professional, lender, or policy maker needs to describe and/or predict a household’s future financial situation. Suggestions for the implementation of ANN modeling procedures by household finance researchers, practitioners, and policy makers are provided.