Increasing Retirement Savings through Access Points and Persuasive Messages

ABSTRACT

We study transaction costs for making deposits within the privatized pension system in Mexico. We analyze an expansion of access channels for additional (voluntary) contributions at 7-Eleven stores, followed by a media campaign providing information on this policy and persuasive messages to save. We estimate a differential 6–9 percent increase in the volume of transactions post-policy in municipalities with 7-Eleven relative to those without. However, due to smaller deposits compared to pre-policy sizes, we find modest effects on the flow of savings. Contribution size was not just smaller for marginal savers, but also decreased significantly for some inframarginal savers.