Studies on labour supply, spending and saving before and after retirement

before and after retirement. Standard economic theory predicts that individuals accumulate wealth during their working career and draw down wealth during retirement. Nonetheless, empirical work shows that old people hold on to their wealth. A better understanding of how individuals prefer to decumulate their wealth during retirement is a common theme in this dissertation. The first essay investigates the importance of alternative motives for choosing a saving and consumption trajectory after retirement in the Netherlands and Australia, whereas the second essay explores the influence of an implied endorsement nudge conveyed by a government-regulated drawdown from pension wealth, on spending patterns in retirement. The third essay uses a stylized structural life-cycle model incorporating behavioural features to analyse stated preferences on preferred spending during the first ten years after retirement. The fourth essay studies the effect of a hospital admission for a specific condition on spending for the Dutch elderly. The final essay investigates the effect of tax-registered parental transfers on the recipients’ labour income in the year of the gift