Declining Financial Literacy Of Australian Teenagers And Who Should Take the Responsibility

There is an article on SMH Australian 15-year-olds declining in financial literacy: PISA report today. The basic gist is that Australian teenagers have low and declining level of financial literacy. One parent suggests math is useless and school should teach should be teaching them about finances and loans.

I do not agree with this view personally, math is the fundamental skill everybody should learn and have. Math skills underpin many basic days to day financial management of ones’ affair. For example, two persons I worked with on daily basis who are smart and articulate. However, given the task of working out how much GST paid on GST inclusive price of 100 dollars had no idea how to do so. If you do not have a basic level of math it is impossible to achieve the level of financial management skill that needed in the modern society. Without some basic math skills, it is very difficult to work out it is better to use the money to pay down your loan first or invest in something else.

In my view, parents are much better equipped to handle the majority of the workload in educating teenagers on the issue of financial literacy. You not able to offer advice and suggest more timely, there is also the opportunities of lead by example which in my view is another important aspect as well. I had a bank account in my primary school years and regularly deposited my pocket money into it. My parents did not force me to do that, they just sort of guided me in that direction and many similar examples like this which greatly benefited me in my adult years.

We as parents cannot expect the school to do everything for our children. We also need to take responsibility and teach our children about this. Most of parents including me have the tendency of over-sheltering our children, but we all need to overcome that and do what is good for our children.

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