Even the highest‐rated life‐annuity providers have a nonzero probability of becoming insolvent during an annuitant's retirement, and many potential annuitants are unaware of the state guaranty associations (SGAs) which provide insurance against the associated financial consequences. We study the theoretical implications of insolvency risk—real and perceived—for annuitization. Then, using a disciplined calibration of annuitant misperceptions in a standard life cycle model, we show that even the modest perceived risk of default associated with highly‐rated providers can—absent awareness of the SGAs—reduce annuitization and significantly reduce welfare. We further consider the implications of information frictions which prevent retirees from discerning true insolvency risk and we find that these frictions have plausibly large additional quantitative implications for annuitization and welfare. Simulations of our model further suggest that the general lack of awareness of the SGA backstop by potential annuitants can erode a sizable fraction of the potential welfare benefits thereof.

中文翻译：

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关于破产风险的信息不完善的最佳年金

即使是评级最高的人寿年金提供者，在退休人员退休期间破产的可能性也不为零，而且许多潜在的退休人员也不知道为这些财务后果提供保险的州担保协会（SGA）。我们研究了破产风险（实际风险和可感知风险）对年金化的理论意义。然后，在标准生命周期模型中使用对年金误解的严格校准，我们表明，即使是与高度评价的提供者相关的适度的违约风险，也可能是由于对SGA缺乏了解而降低年金化并显着降低了福利。我们进一步考虑了信息摩擦的影响，这些信息阻止退休人员辨别真正的破产风险，并且我们发现这些摩擦对年金化和福利可能具有较大的量化影响。我们模型的模拟进一步表明，潜在的年金人对SGA支持的普遍缺乏认识会侵蚀其潜在福利收益的相当一部分。