Gautam Chikermane argues for better financial literacy among India’s students. Thought-provoking, when you consider the implication this has for our next generation. Some snippets:
But the next generation in schools will not have any such false nets to fall on. It is for them that we need to make this investment in financial literacy — today. An investment in teachers, who first need to understand their own finances and then transmit this knowledge and confidence to deal with money to their students.
When they graduate with degrees in engineering, management or philosophy, join the workforce as entrepreneurs, professionals or civil servants, our children will be better able to understand and work with money. They will be more comfortable with equity risk, for instance, and generate more wealth to finance their retirements. They will possibly not fall into the credit trap that students in the West are so prone to — most of them graduate with huge debts.
It is basically an understanding of:
… Spending and debt as we increasingly take on debt to finance education, cars, houses; understanding credit as a financial tool, using mortgages and reverse mortgages….. ‘Situations’ — divorce, disabilities, job loss, inheritance… Transferring wealth to the next generation.