The demand for risk-bearing instruments after a financial crisis : A study made in Helsinki

The study involves finding out the risk-profile of Finnish people. The goal is to show that people who have lived through a financial crisis are more risk-averse than people who have not. The results are gathered by asking three research questions. This was done by examining the risk-profile of people through a questionnaire and analyze the data with the help of literature sources about behavioral economics such as Malmendier and Nagel, Kahneman and Tversky, Dr Grable and Dr Lytton. The research questions asked were the following: 1. Are people over 30 more risk-averse than people under 30? 2. Are people with no experience in investing more risk-averse than people with experience? 3. Are people who have suffered in the 2008 financial crisis more risk-averse than people who have not? The study was made by handing out 120 copies of a questionnaire, based on a prior similar study, to people in Helsinki. Upon the examination of the results, it becomes clear that people who have lived through a financial crisis are not more risk-averse. On the contrary, people who had experienced suffering got higher average scores in the questionnaire than people who did not have. The factor of prior experience was the most clear, the result showed that the more experience you have, the more you are willing to take economic risk. This phenomenon was the most clear among young people. Older people were only a little less risk-seeking than younger people. Through showing that people who have suffered in the 2008 financial crisis are as risk-seeking (if not more) than people who have not, this research found that the 2008 financial crisis does not have an impact on people´s risk-tolerance 10 years after the crisis