Tax incentives, bequest motives, and the demand for life insurance: Evidence from two natural experiments in Germany

Arbeitspapier

Whole life insurance plays an important role in household saving. However, empirical evidence on its determinants is scarce. This paper studies two natural experiments to identify the effects of tax incentives and bequest motives on life-insurance demand. An unanticipated tax reform in 2000 halved the tax exemption limit for capital income in Germany. We document that the demand for life insurance reacted strongly to this change. With regard to bequest motives, we analyze the demand for life insurance in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR). Relative to market-based economies, the socialist GDR can be viewed as an experimental institutional setting where life-insurance demand was not influenced by tax considerations which allows us to isolate bequest motives while controlling for life-cycle and precautionary motives. We find a significantly higher ownership probability among households with children and a high regard for the family, confirming bequest motives in life-insurance demand.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: CESifo Working Paper ; No. 3040

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making‡ ; Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions; Probabilities ; Household Saving; Personal Finance ; Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
• Thema: savings ; life insurance ; capital income taxation ; bequests ; Lebensversicherung ; Nachfrage ; Sparen ; Anlageverhalten ; Erbe ; Kapitalertragsteuer ; Steuerwirkung ; Feldforschung ; Deutschland ; Vergleich ; DDR

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Sauter, Nicolas ; Walliser, Jan ; Winter, Joachim
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo)
• (wo): Munich
• (wann): 2010

Weitere Informationen

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/38932
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:42 MEZ