The role of cultural attributes in savings rates
Purpose – The motivation for conducting this research came from the current global economic crisis. One outcome of the crisis is the awareness of the need for a better understanding of what causes people to save. Low savings rates in Western countries in general and in the USA in particular are the roots of the crisis. Furthermore, saving is probably one of the most important economic variables that impact the local and global environment. The current economic literature neglects the crucial impact that culture has on saving as a consequence we do not fully understand the causes of different saving rates in different societies. The purpose of this paper is to explore the variable of cultural attitudes as an explanation for variations in national savings rates.Design/methodology/approach – The phenomenon of diminishing personal savings cannot be explained simply by the variables studied in the current economic literature, such as interest rates, age of the population and wealth as expressed by GDP per capi...