How can an Erasmus+ KA2 project help you improve your financial literacy?
According to Alan Greenspan, American economist, “the number one problem in today’s generation and economy is the lack of financial literacy”. This issue seems to be persistent in our society, because financial literacy is not improving at the same pace in which financial instruments are becoming available to the general public.
The Erasmus+ KA2 FINMAN project recognises the need for more educated and aware people in financial terms, processes and concepts and aims to reach adults of different age and social groups. The consortium of this project consists of the coordinator RCCI (Bulgaria), Emphasys Centre (Cyprus), UPI (Slovenia), CBE (Belgium), FEUZ (Spain), ATLANTIS ENGINEERING (Greece), Eurocrea Merchant (Italy) and IDEC (Greece). All together aim to produce training content on the most relevant financial literacy topics and to provide real life-oriented knowledge and crucial financial competences to adults with low financial skills.
To understand the current needs and gaps of the society in regards to financial literacy, the consortium organised focus group discussions in all partner countries. Twenty-two (22) sessions were held in total with 74 participants, divided into 37 financial experts (bank officials, teachers, entrepreneurs, accountants etc.) and 37 people with no financial academic knowledge, the so-called end users (young people under the age of 35, university students, unemployed and elderly).
The discussions were based on 8 main topics: taxes, savings and investment, loans and mortgages, online banking, cybersecurity, pensions, social security and thinking early about the future, personal and business budgeting, and lastly, salary, work contract elements. During the interesting discussions, both experts and end-users shared their concerns and opinions about financial literacy, highlighting in many cases the need for more information provided to society. In some cases, specific particularities of the partner countries were mentioned such as tax policies and contract types.
Moreover, all end-users agreed on the importance of understanding basic elements on payslips and work contracts, with young people emphasizing on the fact that information related to this topic should be provided before entering their first job. Participants show considerable interest in loans because they feel that they lack basic information in regards to this topic, as well as to investment and any risks it may bring. Personal budgeting is a topic on which end users do not agree, with some of them giving it very little importance while others plan and monitor their expenses systematically by various apps and excel tables.
On the other hand, experts stressed the necessity to save and invest from an early age as well as the importance to help older people with online financial services. Furthermore, they agree with the end-users on the need to be able to understand basic elements of work contracts and payslips and personal budgeting for them is essential. Lastly, it is interesting to note that the difference between people’s opinion does not exist based on nationality or academic background but age. More specifically, there is an evident age gap between young and older people in regards to competences and attitudes towards online banking and cybersecurity. Young people, as digital natives, frequently use online financial services whereas older people do to not have much confidence in them.
In conclusion, the focus group activity was a big success. The majority of participants shared the same opinions in all 8 topics, emphasizing on the personal attitude to money, savings, taxes, and investing. The lack of financially literate adults was visible and highlighted in all focus group sessions, showing the need and importance of the FINMAN project. The consortium will now continue with the development of 8 modules, aiming to improve end users’ skills and knowledge on financial literacy. If you are interested in the topic of financial literacy and want to keep track of future project activities and updates about the development of the training content, follow us at @Project.Finman.
