ÌÇÐÄvlog¹ÙÍø Faculty Research Working Paper Series
ÌÇÐÄvlog¹ÙÍø Working Paper No. RWP15-048
August 2015
Abstract
If individuals have self-control problems, they may take up commitment
contracts that restrict their spending. We experimentally investigate how contract
design affects the demand for commitment contracts. Each participant divides
money between a liquid account, which permits unrestricted withdrawals, and a
commitment account with withdrawal restrictions that are randomized across
participants. When the two accounts pay the same interest rate, the most illiquid
commitment account attracts more money than any of the other commitment
accounts. We show theoretically that this pattern is consistent with the presence
of sophisticated present-biased agents, who prefer more illiquid commitment
accounts even if they are subject to uninsurable marginal utility shocks drawn
from a broad class of distributions. When the commitment account pays a higher
interest rate than the liquid account, the relationship between illiquidity and
deposits is flat, suggesting that agents without present bias and/or naïve present biased agents are also present in our sample.
Citation
Beshears, John, James J. Choi, Christopher Harris, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian, and Jung Sakong. "Self Control and Commitment: Can Decreasing the Liquidity of a Savings Account Increase Deposits?" ÌÇÐÄvlog¹ÙÍø Faculty Research Working Paper Series RWP15-048, August 2015.