Measuring and profiling financial literacy in South Africa

Elizabeth Lwanga Nanziri and Murray Leibbrandt
Additional contact information
Elizabeth Lwanga Nanziri: SALDRU, University of Cape Town

No 171, SALDRU Working Papers from Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, University of Cape Town

Abstract: Microeconomic theories of financial behaviour tend to assume that consumers possess financial skills necessary to undertake related financial decisions. We investigate this assumption by exploring the distribution of financial literacy among South Africans. In the absence of a standard measure, a financial literacy index is constructed for the country using data collected on attitudes (towards), access to and use of financial services over the period 2005 – 2009. We use the index to examine the extent to which differences in financial literacy correlate with demographic and economic characteristics. The Index reveals substantial variation in financial literacy by age, education, province and race. Overall, demographic characteristics contribute up to 10% of the financial literacy differences among individuals in South Africa. These results can be used to guide policy makers where to place more emphasis in terms of financial education for South Africans.

Keywords: financial literacy; index; South Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D14 G19 O55 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://opensaldru.uct.ac.za/bitstream/handle/1109 ... druwp.pdf?sequence=1 Full text (application/pdf)

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:ldr:wpaper:171

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in SALDRU Working Papers from Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, University of Cape Town Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Alison Siljeur ().