Consumer Finance
Our Consumer Finance Institute researches how people earn, spend, save, and invest, as well as how credit markets and payment systems affect the economy. Our goal is to foster a healthy consumer sector, a stable financial system, and a resilient regional and national economy.
Working Paper
Does Experience Matter? Past Fraud Exposure, Data Compromises, and Credit Market Behavior
WP 26-10 – We study how past experiences with fraud affect individuals’ likelihood of taking precautionary action in credit markets when faced with a new shock that raises their fraud risks.
Working Paper
Model Risk Under CECL: A Consumer Finance Perspective
WP 26-09 – The author examines the challenges of economic forecasting and model misspecification errors confronted by financial institutions implementing the novel current expected credit loss (CECL) allowance methodology and its impact on model risk and bias in CECL projections.
Working Paper
Credit Scores and Inequality Across the Life Cycle
WP 26-07 – Among a cohort born in the same year, inequality in consumption, income, and credit scores (reputational inequality) rises with age. Models of reputation formation are presented to explain these patterns. Information bans are studied.
Working Paper
Explaining Contract Heterogeneity in the Credit Card Market
WP 26-03 – Administrative data are used to establish facts on terms, usage, and default rate of credit card accounts. A credit card model is developed to explain the facts. The model explains high MPCs and implies the rate caps are welfare-reducing.
Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) Lender File
31 Jul ’25
The HMDA Lender File includes characteristics of firms receiving mortgage applications and originating loans. The data set enables users to connect HMDA filers to their parent organizations and compare a filer’s lending over time.
Working Paper
Consumer Credit with Over-Optimistic Borrowers
WP 21-42/R – Do cognitive biases call for regulation to limit the use of credit? We incorporate over-optimistic and rational borrowers into an incomplete markets model with consumer bankruptcy.