Financial Education for Youth
The Role of Schools
The importance of financial literacy and specifically the need to promote financial education has been recognised as an important contributor to improved financial inclusion and individuals’ financial well-being as well as a support to financial stability. The relevance of financial education policies is acknowledged at the highest global policy level: in 2012, G20 Leaders endorsed the OECD/INFE High-level Principles on National Strategies for Financial Education that specifically identify youth as one of the priority targets of government policies in this domain. That same year, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Ministers of Finance identified financial literacy as a critical life skill.
The publication addresses the challenges linked to the introduction of financial education in schools, and provides practical guidance and case studies to assist policy makers, and a comparative analysis of existing learning frameworks for financial education in the formal school system.
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Executive summary
Most national financial education strategies have youth among the key target groups. As such, they aim at introducing financial education into the school curriculum and designing dedicated learning frameworks. The rationale for this focus and these new policy endeavours is multi-fold. First, while financial education concerns all ages, the education of younger generations on financial issues has become all the more important since they will likely bear more financial risks and be faced with increasingly complex and sophisticated financial products than their parents. Second, the young have access to, and are being offered, financial services at ever earlier ages (through pocket money, mobile phones, bank accounts, or even credit cards). Yet, most recent surveys show worrying low levels of youth financial literacy and, in many cases, significantly lower levels than older generations.
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