The rapid expansion of mobile sports betting in the United States poses a growing threat to the financial well-being of military personnel, particularly young enlisted soldiers. This paper explores how the unique characteristics of military life – such as high stress, risk tolerance, and financial vulnerability – intersect with the accessibility and psychological appeal of mobile sports betting platforms. Drawing on recent data and behavioral research, we examine the potential prevalence of gambling among soldiers, the potential for addiction, and the broader implications for mental health and unit readiness. The analysis highlights how mobile betting undermines personal economic security by reducing savings and investment behaviors, such as contributions to the thrift savings plan (TSP). Despite the Department of Defense’s efforts to promote financial literacy, current financial education programs often overlook gambling risks. We argue for the urgent integration of targeted financial education, behavioral health support, and policy interventions to mitigate the impact of mobile sports betting. This paper contributes to the emerging discourse on digital gambling and military readiness, emphasizing the need for proactive strategies to safeguard soldiers’ financial and psychological resilience.

The digital and sustainable transitions represent two strategic drivers of growth and innovation for micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises. This is especially relevant for micro-firms, which significantly lag behind larger firms in these areas. Financial literacy can play a key role in guiding small entrepreneurs to make sound financial choices and make the so-called twin transition successful. We exploit a survey conducted by the Bank of Italy in 2021 – involving about 2,000 non-financial firms with less than 10 employees – to investigate whether financial literacy acts as a driver for the twin transition. Through instrumental variable estimation, we find evidence of a causal link between financial literacy and both digitalisation and engagement in sustainable activities.

Using a nationally representative US sample of 9,623 adults from 26 countries of ancestries, we investigate the role of culture in explaining the gender gap in financial literacy. We find that (i) the smaller the gender gap in financial literacy in the country of ancestry, the higher the financial understanding of women in the US relative to men and (ii) higher patience and lower altruism in the country of ancestry are associated with greater financial literacy in the US for men but not women. Even after controlling for gender variation in these preferences, country-of-ancestry gender gap in financial literacy remains strongly associated with women’s higher financial literacy, especially for knowledge of inflation and risk diversification. This finding suggests that gender differences in financial literacy are shaped by social constructs.

We explore debt and debt management among older Americans (ages 51–61 years) using the 2018 National Financial Capability Study. Though these individuals should have been at the peak of their retirement savings, we show that many were heavily indebted, often due to unpaid medical bills and student loans. Additionally, fewer than half (43%) could correctly answer three basic financial literacy questions; importantly, less financially literate people were more likely to hold excessive debt, be contacted by debt collectors, and carry medical debt or student loans. Our findings show that, even before the pandemic, a sizable proportion of older Americans was financially distressed, underscoring the need for researchers and policymakers to devote attention to specific types of debt that burden the older population. Particularly vulnerable groups include African-Americans, women, and the least-educated.

Some Americans prepare for unanticipated adverse economic events, plan for the future, and keep their debt at manageable levels, but others do not. Using four waves of the Understanding America Study during the pandemic period, we compare middle-aged and older Black, Hispanic, and White Americans’ financial resilience from 2020 to 2024. After uncovering significant initial differences in their financial preparedness at the outset of the pandemic, we confirm that greater financial resilience enhanced peoples’ chances of realizing better economic outcomes when confronting adverse economic shocks. The 2024 wave shows systematic differences in financial resilience across the demographic groups and indicates how greater resilience affects financial satisfaction.

The National Financial Capability Study (NFCS) is a large-scale, ongoing research project of the FINRA Foundation that provides a broad range of stakeholders the ability to examine and better understand the financial capability of U.S. adults. First introduced in 2009, the NFCS has dozens of publicly available reports and data sets that are free to download. Data from the NFCS contain information on people’s ability to make ends meet, their management of financial products and services, the extent to which they plan ahead, their financial knowledge and decision-making, and numerous other topics. This paper provides an overview of the history, methodology, and some insights gained from the NFCS over the years. In addition, given the NFCS’ unique role as the birthplace of the Big 5 financial literacy questions that are present in all waves of the NFCS, we discuss the role of the NFCS in aiding our understanding of financial knowledge in the United States. The paper concludes with a look toward the future of the NFCS.

We use the 529 college savings plan setting to investigate whether and why households make suboptimal choices to invest in local assets. We estimate that 67% of open accounts between 2010 and 2020 were located suboptimally due to the plans’ tax inefficiencies and high expenses. Over the accounts’ projected lifetimes, such investments yielded expected losses of 8% on average or $15.6 billion in 2020 alone. We then investigate why suboptimal investment is so prevalent. Consistent with households’ lack of understanding of state-level tax benefits, we find that a meaningful proportion of households does not account for the potential tax benefits and costs of local versus nonlocal 529 investment. Household financial literacy and plan disclosure complexity appear to explain suboptimal investment patterns, which further supports the role of information-processing frictions. Our study presents novel evidence on individuals’ preferences for local assets and how information-processing frictions shape their investment decisions, reducing their financial well-being.

Since 2012, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), an initiative of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), has been collecting data to evaluate the financial literacy of 15-year-old students in various countries. The triennial assessments provide an opportunity to study the determinants of financial literacy among the young and how it evolves over time. This article looks back at a decade of PISA financial literacy data and examines the four waves of student-level data collected so far (2012, 2015, 2018, and 2022). We document stylized facts across waves and provide guidance on using the test scores estimated from psychometric models.

For the very first time, in the Spring of 2023, the European Commission (EC) carried out a survey across all member states to assess their level of financial literacy. This survey complements other national surveys and fills an important gap because it provides a consistent metric that allows comparisons among the European Union (EU) countries. The motivation behind the EC’s survey stems from the need to advance the state of financial literacy to safeguard financial stability and promote important projects, such as the creation of a Capital Markets Union. In this paper, we analyze these new data and confirm findings in the literature about the importance of being financially knowledgeable to achieve good financial outcomes. Unfortunately, the survey also confirms that barely one in two individuals, on average in the EU, is financially literate.

This paper surveys what we have learned on financial literacy and its relation to financial behavior from data collected in the Dutch Central Bank (DNB) Household Survey, a project done in collaboration with academics. A pioneering survey fielded in 2005 included an extensive set of financial literacy questions and questions that can serve as instruments for financial literacy in regression analyses to assess the causal effect of financial literacy on behavior. We describe how this survey spurred a series of research papers demonstrating the crucial role of financial literacy in stock market participation, retirement planning, and wealth accumulation. This inspired various follow-up studies and experiments based on new data collections in the DNB Household Survey. Researchers worldwide have used these data for innovative studies, and other surveys have included similar questions. This case study exemplifies the essential role of data in empirical research, showing how innovative data collections can inspire new research initiatives and significantly contribute to our understanding of household financial decision-making.

We measure crypto and financial literacy using microdata from the Bank of Canada’s Bitcoin Omnibus Survey. Our crypto literacy measure is based on three questions covering basic aspects of Bitcoin. The financial literacy measure we use is based on three questions covering basic aspects of conventional finance (the “Big Three”). We find that a significant share of Canadian Bitcoin owners have low crypto knowledge and low financial literacy. We also find gender differences in crypto literacy among Bitcoin owners, with female owners scoring lower in Bitcoin knowledge than male owners. We do not, however, find significant gender differences in financial literacy amongst Bitcoin owners. In contrast, non-owners show gender differences in both crypto and financial literacy.

This paper examines financial literacy in Canada using a dataset from early 2023 that measures the knowledge of middle-aged Canadians regarding their retirement income system. We first document important financial literacy differences across gender, age, education, and labor market status. Using detailed questions on the four main aspects of the retirement income system, we then show a strong correlation between financial literacy and the knowledge of the retirement system in Canada. Finally, we provide evidence that general financial literacy and knowledge of the retirement system matter for retirement preparation, by showing that Canadians with higher financial literacy scores and better knowledge of the retirement system are more likely to have a plan for retirement.

In this paper, we provide an analysis of financial literacy in Peru and Uruguay. We find that the knowledge of simple concepts at the basis of financial decision-making is low in both countries. Not only is financial illiteracy widespread, but it is particularly acute among women, rural populations, the less educated, low-income people, the self-employed, the not employed, younger people (in the case of Peru), and older people (in the case of Uruguay). We also find that financial literacy is linked to measures of financial wellbeing: those who are financially literate are more likely to be able to save and plan for retirement in both countries. In addition, we find a relationship between knowledge of specific concepts and key financial behaviors. Lastly, we find a relationship between financial literacy and financial resilience

We examine financial literacy in Finland and its connection with various financial outcomes using novel survey data collected in 2023. While the overall Finnish financial literacy level is about average among the OECD countries, there is significant heterogeneity within the population. Women have lower financial literacy than men. The young and the old have lower financial literacy than respondents in their prime working age, and entrepreneurs have higher financial literacy than other groups. Financial literacy is also correlated with higher educational levels. We further study the relationship between financial literacy and a number of economic outcome variables. We find financial literacy to be negatively related to coping with a major expense, facing an income shock, and with perceived over-indebtedness. However, we do not find a statistically significant relationship between financial literacy and retirement planning in Finland.

We analyze financial literacy regarding interest rates, inflation, and risk diversification in nine Eastern European countries based on survey data collected in the fall 2022. The percentage of individuals with an understanding of all three concepts is generally low but varies strongly among countries, from 13 percent in Romania to 47 percent in the Czech Republic. Financial illiteracy is particularly acute among those with primary or lower secondary education. Among the three concepts, inflation is what people know best in eight out of nine countries – a pattern which has emerged recently and is in contrast to other countries, where interest rate literacy is highest. Differences in lifetime inflation experience, in particular experience of high or hyperinflation, affect inflation literacy. Higher financial literacy is associated with a higher propensity to save and a lower propensity to be financially vulnerable in six out of nine countries.

This paper examines financial literacy in Japan using a recent dataset from 2022 and finds that financial literacy levels are low. Only 36% of the respondents could correctly answer the Big Three financial literacy questions, three well-known questions assessing the understanding of interest, inflation, and risk diversification. Also, significant demographic variation exists in the Japanese population: the young, women, and the less educated are those who struggle the most with these fundamental financial concepts. Additionally, we find that Japanese who know the basics about environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG)-related principles are also those who show better financial literacy levels than those who do not know about ESG. Lastly, our results confirm that financial literacy matters: it is strongly and positively correlated with active investment behavior, which may affect wealth accumulation and financial wellbeing.

In this paper, we examine financial literacy in Singapore. Using data from the SKBI-GFLEC Sustainable Investment Survey, we find that approximately 40% of Singaporeans are financially literate. We also find that financial literacy is low among specific groups such as women, the less educated, and the unemployed. Moreover, we examine financial literacy across Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) literacy. We find that those with higher ESG knowledge are also more financially literate, showing that knowledge of these two different financial concepts is positively correlated. Finally, our results show that financial literacy can be linked to investment behavior which may affect financial well-being in the long run.

In this paper, we examine financial literacy and financial resilience in Italy. We show that financial literacy is particularly low among the young, women, and the less educated. We also highlight regional differences in financial knowledge, with individuals in Southern Italy performing worse. We find that the lack of financial literacy increases the probability of being unable to face financial shocks and leads to an overaccumulation of debt. Hence, our results support the hypothesis that financial literacy can be considered an enabling factor for financial resilience.

This paper examines global data on unbanked and underbanked consumers to highlight the role improved financial literacy and capability could play in motivating and enabling the safe and beneficial use of financial services. The paper uses Global Findex data, a demand-side survey on ownership and use of accounts at formal financial institutions, such as a bank or similar financial institution, or a mobile money service provider. The paper reviews the self-reported barriers to account ownership and use cited by unbanked adults and identifies the challenges faced by account owners who could not use an account without help. Together, these issues point to the importance of financial education to improve digital and financial literacy skills, in addition to product design that considers customer abilities, and strong consumer safeguards to ensure that customers benefit from financial access.

Few retirees use reverse mortgages. In this paper, we investigate how financial literacy and prior knowledge of the product influence take-up by conducting a stated-preference experiment. We exogenously manipulate characteristics of reverse mortgages to tease out how consumers value them and investigate differences by financial literacy and prior knowledge of reverse mortgages. We find that those with higher financial knowledge are more likely to know about reverse mortgages, not more likely to purchase them at any cost but are more sensitive to the interest rate and the insurance value of these products in terms of the non-negative equity guarantee.