Navigating Complex Financial Decisions at Retirement: Evidence from Annuity Choices in Public Sector Pensions

We thank Melinda Sandler Morrill, whose contributions at an earlier stage of this project are greatly appreciated. This research is part of an on-going project that is being conducted in partnership with the North Carolina Retirement Systems Division and is being funded by the Sloan Foundation, Grant Numbers 2013-10-20 and G-2016-7054. We gratefully acknowledge the help and support of Janet Cowell, former North Carolina State Treasurer, Steven C. Toole, Director of the Retirement Systems Division, Mary Buonfiglio, Deputy Director of Supplemental Retirement Plans, and Sam Watts, Policy Director of the Retirement Systems Division; Nino Abashidze, Bryan Allard, Christelle Khalaf, Siyan Liu, Aditi Pathak, and Emma Turner for research assistance; and Jonathan Reuter and participants at the NBER Conference on Incentives and Limitations of Employment Policies on Retirement Transitions for comments and suggestions. The opinions and conclusions expressed herein are solely those of the authors and do not represent the opinions or policy of the North Carolina Retirement System, any other institution with which the authors are affiliated, or the National Bureau of Economic Research.