Anna Maria Lusardi teaches the finance to all
Posted on April 22, 2010 by christopher
The crisis has demonstrated poor knowledge of economic concepts and financial base is widespread in large sections of the population, both the U.S. and Europe. And this leads to making bad decisions on loans as on pensions. The consequences are disastrous, not only at the microeconomic level, but macroeconomic. That the U.S. has launched several programs for financial literacy in schools. What is more, such courses should be held even in companies.
April has been declared the month of “financial literacy”. If the argument is mostly one month, it is clear that is perceived as a problem. And the problem is, we have seen in particular with the financial crisis.
The financial crisis has highlighted four events. First, the lack of knowledge in financial matters, with the resulting decisions inappropriate and incorrect, is widespread in large sections of the population, and secondly, the financial problems can go unnoticed for long periods of time before exploding on the surface, and thirdly, the consequences of errors Financial can be devastating for individuals and families, the fourth, the costs of these errors are high not only at the micro level but also at the macro level. The lack of financial literacy has been documented not only in the United States, but also in many European countries, including Italy. Although families must increasingly assume responsibility for decisions relating to their pension, and must do so in the presence of financial markets more complex than in the past, knowledge of basic concepts of economics and finance is very limited. For example, data released last December by the U.S. Treasury and the FINRA Investor Education Foundation shows that most families are not familiar with the compound interest rate, inflation and risk diversification. The figures in the investigation of the Bank of Italy on the budgets of Italian families in 2006 suggest an even more alarming.