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Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

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Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#81

Post by mellosouls »

apatters wrote: post #21
mellosouls wrote: post #10

everyone should a fundamental understanding of how a savings account, CD account, IRA, Roth IRA, 401(k) and MSA account work. Likewise, everyone should have a fundamental understanding of the equity markets, derivatives markets, futures markets, bond and treasury markets along with an understanding of how interest rates work and their effects on financial instruments like mortgages. How much money do you think most p…

Completely disagree. Even $100/mo invested into an index fund using a Roth IRA in your 20s will have a huge positive return on your quality of life later on. Millions of workers can afford this and don't do it because they haven't been taught/shown the value.

I acknowledged the basics should be taught; and how compound interest and small investment early on would be part of that - the multitude of further options and detail aren't core.

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#82

Post by mellosouls »

rayhendricks wrote: post #32
mellosouls wrote: post #10

everyone should a fundamental understanding of how a savings account, CD account, IRA, Roth IRA, 401(k) and MSA account work. Likewise, everyone should have a fundamental understanding of the equity markets, derivatives markets, futures markets, bond and treasury markets along with an understanding of how interest rates work and their effects on financial instruments like mortgages. How much money do you think most p…

We need more VTSAX and less english majors. Start saving young and income doesn't really matter if your trying to FIRE. Also healthy eating habits and information about birth control should be taught in addition to financial literacy and at the expense of the current curriculum, but it is not because politics (both left and right here).

I'd agree with most of that; my point is there are many years of education - investing a significant amount of that in knowledge about the complexities of financial markets is utterly irrelevant to most people's lives; Maths and English are far more important at a deeper level over a life lived than bloody stocks and shares.

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#83

Post by bartaxyz »

sam_lowry_ wrote: post #76
bartaxyz wrote: post #17

I studied in Czech Republic and we had entire class spanning out over two years for economic and financial literacy at my high school. On the practical level, we were even tasked to fill out tax returns for a fictional company and we learned how to start freelancing & start a company. It was a high school in a rather small town on the south of Czech Republic, nothing special. I don't know how common this is in the re…

What was that small town, Brno? Now known as RedHat european HQ location?

It was Písek. Waaay smaller than Brno.

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#84

Post by sofixa »

bawolff wrote: post #38
justalanm wrote: post #23

Finance doesn't create value, most of the times actually destroys it. Moreover, you're looking at this with a clearly US-centric perspective, in many other countries we don't need to know about retirement schemes, school loans and health insurance policies (you seem to have forgotten that insurance IS finance, but this might be just another example of the reason why this is hairy). So, if tomorrow all of this changes…

So, if you dont need to know about school loans, how about car loans, morgatges, credit cards etc. If not, which communist utopia are you thinking of where you never have to worry about money, and how do i move there?

Credit cards are rare and pretty much useless in most European countries ( and damn right unusable in the Netherlands for instance).

Mortgages and car loans are pretty simple due to heavy regulation ( they have to show the total interest, how much you will end up paying in interest over the lifespan, etc.), what's there to learn about them?

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#85

Post by anjellow »

PurpleFoxy wrote: post #75
aliassmith wrote: post #43

Every recommendation to add "x" to a school curriculum should state explicitly what alternative activity should be cut to free up time. This could be another subject, sleep or childrens' free time. For example, a better question would be "Why don't we eliminate and teach finance instead?"

We could eliminate religion classes from schools

The only schools with religious ed are religious schools. Do you think this would be a general fix?

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#86

Post by Macha »

So in Ireland:

In junior cycle (the first three years), we had a mandatory module "Business Studies". It had two purposes, the first was an introduction to the basics of the more specific modules available from your chosen modules in senior cycle (Accounting, Economics and Business). The second was to cover personal financial details, so it covered household budgeting, pensions (at a shallow level, e.g. defined benefit vs defined contribution and employer contributions never came up, because most students were not going to be in a job where they had much choice), how taxes are calculated (but not how to file returns, thats mostly only a concern for self employed people) and consumer rights. There was also a brief sole trader vs coop vs limited company overview, but my understanding is the senior cycle business module covered this in more detail.

If you then went on to do economics for senior cycle, bonds, equity and futures were covered.

IRA was more a discussion for the history classes however (the different meaning in the US leads to bemusing alternative reading of US ads for Irish people)

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#88

Post by natmaka »

jay_kyburz wrote: post #59
natmaka wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think those fundamentals were better taught to kids in the past, nor did I state it. In my opinion kids were and are taught way too many ancillary or even dubious (sheer propaganda) stuff, and not enough fundamentals (arithmetic being one, critical thinking another, logic, collaborative work...).

I think kids might go too deep on some subjects in late high school. My kids are only in primary school now, but I have been looking ahead at year 10 text books and wow, there really is a lot of stuff in there you would only need once you start specializing in a particular field. I wonder if at some point we need to pivot to teaching that the knowledge is out there, and when you might need it, rather than exactly how…

I agree. We define the fundamentals, which are to be mastered (without any searching), and for each of them a way to detect when the kid is ready to learn it quickly. For the rest we simply teach them to search ( to be autonomous).

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#89

Post by Tsarbomb »

In Canada: Grade 10&11 business classes that involved project management, marketing, budgeting, technical skills tracking numbers with spreadsheets, and just some general accounting principles.

It doesn't exactly overlap with what you are saying, but it doesn't leave you an idiot either. Plus in Canada a lot of the taxation and investment vehicles are much simpler giving a lower barrier of entry.

Re: Ask HN: Why isn’t finance a part of the core curriculum at schools?

#90

Post by jl2718 »

This information is readily available already. The only important thing is what’s not available.

My brother got the best small business education possible by selling energy contracts door-to-door. He learned how every type of small business in NYC works: how much money they make, how much money comes from ‘other’ sources, how they manage cash versus credit income, how much gets stolen from them, who owns the businesses, who gave them the loan to start the business, how much time it takes, how they hire and manage employees, the type of people you have to deal with, the ways your own employees and partners will scam you, the family and personal problems that destroy people, the simple patterns to success and failure.

No teacher knows any of this. If it was in a book, you either wouldn’t believe it, or you would drop out like he did, and do something simple for yourself instead of letting other people tell you what to do, like I did.

Young attractive women also get an excellent financial education through dating, at least in terms of how much money people have made through various means, and how smart they have to be for it. I think this is yet another reason why women quit the engineering pipeline.

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