Financial Literacy Among German Students at Secondary Schools: Some Empirical Evidence from the State of Hesse

Volker Brühl

Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik), 2019, vol. 65, issue 4, 299-326

Abstract: Since the financial crisis financial literacy has attracted growing interest among researchers and policy makers, as there is international empirical evidence that financial literacy is poor among both adults and students. In Germany we have almost no empirical evidence on financial literacy, especially in the case of students attending secondary schools, as financial education has not featured on German school curricula to date. Besides, Germany has not yet participated in the optional financial literacy module of PISA, which was offered for the first time in 2012. However, a lack of private pension provisioning, in spite of demographic change, and low stock ownership among German households indicate a deficit in financial knowledge and skills in this country as well. -- In this paper we investigate financial literacy among students aged 14 to 16 attending a secondary school in the state of Hesse. The foundation is a test designed according to international standards. The statistical analysis of the test reveals substantial deficits in key areas of financial literacy. Particular deficits could be identified in the fields of basic knowledge of financial matters and, to an even greater degree, in more advanced concepts such as risk diversification. Applying interest calculations to financial matters turned out to be problematic for many students. -- Furthermore, the paper analyses the impact of gender and type of school on the overall test score as well as test performance in specific tasks. The findings suggest that financial matters should be covered in some form at secondary schools. In light of the potentially far-reaching consequences of financial illiteracy for financial wellbeing, German participation in future PISA financial literacy tests seems highly advisable to gain a deeper understanding of the preliminary findings presented in this paper.

Keywords: Financial Literacy; Household Finance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.3790/aeq.65.4.299 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers (2008 onwards); Pay-per-view access from https://elibrary.duncker-humblot.com/journals/aeq (2008 onwards) and http://www.genios.de (2008 onwards)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:dah:aeqaeq:v65_y2019_i4_q4_p299-326

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.duncker-humblot.de/zeitschriften/aeq

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik) is currently edited by Cinzia Alcidi, Christian Dreger and Daniel Gros

More articles in Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik) from Duncker & Humblot GmbH, Berlin
Bibliographic data for series maintained by E-Publishing-Team ().