60% of Americans believe personal finance should be taught in school – here’s how it could benefit you

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There’s a good chance you didn’t learn much – or anything – about personal finance in school. This may explain why many Americans are not good with money.

According to a FICO study, three in five Americans – 60% – believe personal finance is one of the most valuable subjects that can be taught to students in high school. In fact, the only subjects respondents cited as more useful in adulthood were math (66%) and English (65%).

Still, most people don’t learn important financial skills in school. Only 46% of Americans said they were taught personal finance skills in a high school classroom.

The impact of this lack of financial education in schools appears to be clearly visible, as according to FICO, more than a quarter of Generation Z adults rate themselves as not financially literate – significantly more than Millennials, Generation X and Baby Boomers. Even worse, a quarter of Generation Z adults believe they did not have sufficient personal finance knowledge to achieve their financial goals in the past year.

Overall, 90% of Generation Z adults believe they would be better off financially if they had more access to financial resources and education. You’re not alone in this way of thinking, as 74% of Americans feel the same way.

Change could be on the horizon

Personal finance education may not have been a priority in the past, but things may look different at many schools in the near future.

According to the Council for Economic Education’s 2024 Survey of the States, more than half – 28 – states currently require students to take an economics course to graduate high school. This includes three states that have been added in the past two years.

Even more promising, 35 states now require students to take a course in personal finance to graduate from high school. Twelve states have been added to this list since 2022.

In fact, California, Alaska and Washington, DC are the only places where personal finance is not included in state – or territorial – standards.

Americans in debt

Improved financial literacy could help Americans improve their ability to raise money. Giving people the tools to make smart financial decisions early in life can help them avoid taking on more debt than they can handle.

According to Experian, U.S. consumers had $17.1 trillion in debt in the third quarter of 2023. The bulk of that – $11 trillion – is collateralized by assets, but credit card debt in particular saw balance growth of 17.4% in 2023.

According to Experian, the next generation is Millennials (average $125,047 per person), followed by Baby Boomers (average $94,880 per person), and then Generation Z with an average of $29,820 per person.

According to Experian, the generation with a slightly different rhythm is Baby Boomers (an average of $6,642 per person), followed by Millennials (an average of $6,521 per person), and then Generation Z with an average of $3,262 per person.

If the focus continues on providing financial education in schools – and it is effective – future generations could be more in tune with one another. If learning how to manage money properly becomes a habit, carrying large amounts of debt could become more of an outlier than the norm.