Financial Education Affects Financial Knowledge and Downstream Behaviors

Abstract

We study the rapidly growing literature on the causal effects of financial education programs in a meta-analysis of 76 randomized experiments with a total sample size of over 160,000 individuals. The evidence shows that financial education programs have, on average, positive causal treatment effects on financial knowledge and downstream financial behaviors. Treatment effects are economically meaningful in size, similar to those realized by educational interventions in other domains and are at least three times as large as the average effect documented in earlier work. These results are robust to the method used, restricting the sample to papers published in top economics journals, including only studies with adequate power, and accounting for publication selection bias in the literature. We conclude with a discussion of the cost-effectiveness of financial education interventions.

Building Better Retirement Systems in the Wake of the Global Pandemic

“…Indeed, recent research has demonstrated a strong positive effect of financial literacy and financial education on financial behaviors and retirement preparedness (Lusardi and Mitchell, 2014;Kaiser et al 2020), including reducing peoples' tendency to take on and hold debt at older ages (Lusardi et al 2013(Lusardi et al , 2019.…”

Financial literacy in the digital age—A research agenda

“…The bulk of the literature on financial literacy has focused on three key areas: conceptual definitions of financial literacy (Remund, 2010;Santini et al, 2019;Warmath & Zimmerman, 2019), measurement of the elements of financial literacy (Huston, 2010;Lusardi, 2015;Lusardi & Mitchell, 2014), and financial education (Fernandes et al, 2014;Kaiser et al, 2022;Lusardi et al, 2017;Peeters et al, 2018). While much of the prior research on financial literacy and personal money management was developed in a traditional analog world, it may no longer be compatible with the new and more complex financial landscape created by the pervasive diffusion of digital technologies.…”