The Need for Personal Finance Education

The Need for Personal Finance Education

Move away from corporate and governmental paternalism

Increasingly unstable financial world

General lack of knowledge about finance

Move away from corporate and governmental paternalism

Longer life expectancies

• 63 in 1935
• 80 in 1996

Decreasing number of workers per Social Security recipient

• 14 in 1955
• 3.5 in 1996
• 2.0 in 2020

Downsizing of corporations

Corporations hesitant to accept pension liabilities

Increasingly unstable financial world

Stock and bond markets are much more unstable

The bond market expecially is much more volatile than it was 30 years ago

International currencies are no longer fixed

General lack of knowledge about finance

Two-thirds of Americans don't understand tax-deferred saving

Three-fourths of Americans don't understand compounding

New financial products developed to help cope with volatile financial world