Children’s financial education under the spotlight
The French Banking Federation unveiled the results of its research into children’s financial education on March 25. Focus on the main conclusions.
Coinciding with European Money Week and the renewal of the “I invite a banker into my classroom” operation, the French Banking Federation unveiled the results of its survey on the subject of children and financial education conducted by Harris Interactive. How do children relate to money? How to do they go about spending their money? What subjects are they interested in? The research showed children aged as young as nine are encouraged to manage their own budgets and are interested in elementary financial education concepts.
Children and managing their budgets
For proof, 96% of children have already made a purchase with their money. Their prime source of funds is through money gifted at New Year or for other occasions (83% of children), ahead of pocket money (47%) or money they earn in exchange for a service (31%).
Budget education
The second element: parents are the main source of their knowledge and discussions regarding financial education (93% of children), followed by friends (76%), school (73%) and grandparents (63%). Note, however, that budgets and bank accounts appear to be more abstract concepts. A high proportion of children (61%) expressed a need for explanations on how budgets work. Regarding the perceived value of objects, products are deemed to be “cheap” or "not expensive" at €10 on average, and "expensive" as from €84 on average.
The impact of internet
Lastly, regarding their ability to buy things on their own on internet, 59% of children considered that such purchases were only allowed from the age of 18. In practice, almost half of 8-14 year olds said that they had made an online purchase, mostly with the agreement of an adult.