Flutterby™! : Financial Education

Alternatives to Financial Education for inclusion in The Handbook of Financial Literacy (Cude & Nicolini, eds., Routledge 2021) Lauren E. Willis

In addition, many programs intentionally inculcate trust in the current financial structure of society, and in the formal banking system in particular. However, unwarranted trust is financially dangerous and politically disempowering. An anecdote is instructive. To teach children about the banking system, a U.S. primary school walked its students to a local bank where each opened a savings account into which each deposited $5. Implicit in this activity is the message that the bank is trustworthy. Another bank then acquired that bank and charged all low balance accountholders a monthly maintenance fee that wiped out the children’s savings. The children may have learned a more important lesson about the financial sector than the school intended.