Should Financial Education be Mandatory?

Depending on the time of year Sunday mornings are usually taken up by either a workout at my gym or a best-of-three singles match with Paul, my longtime tennis partner.

And as I have noted in this space on more than one occasion, the winter of 2015 has forced yours truly indoors roughly 99 percent of the time – which for the past several months has meant the gym.

Sunday mornings are also a listen to veteran financial planner and author Rick Edelman, whose show on the Sabbath airs from 10 am to noon, where he expounds on a variety of topics as well as addresses various money-related questions from callers. To some he may be a familiar name with financial tomes such as “The Truth About Money,” to his credit.

This Sunday he posited an interesting point  – should a course or two in financial education be mandatory for high school students much the way math and science are?

Having known a number of financial planners during my tenure covering the accounting profession, I can safely say that nearly all of them believe that financial education is a subject that cannot be taught too early.

And there are enough available statistics to more than validate that belief.

For example, financial services firm Genworth released the results of a recent survey that found that 53 percent of U.S. adults have not begun to make any type of financial arrangements for retirement. And of the respondents who have begun saving for retirement, the average age they began was 33.

So if those surveyed followed the traditional timeline of beginning their careers soon after college that’s nearly a decade of working before commencing to save for retirement.

My daughter recently began working at her first full-time job and I told her the minute she became eligible for their retirement plan, sign up like her life depended upon it and that I stressed that urgency was not simply a father’s hyperbole.

Her post-work lifestyle really does depend on it.

One of the best courses I ever took in high school was home economics. The instructor, a diminutive and highly patient woman, Mrs. Niedbalski, taught us the rudiments of cooking and sewing. Today I can still sew a loose button on my shirt and can easily navigate my way around a kitchen. I make a terrific Tuscan steak or linguini and clam sauce if I say so myself.

Those are learned skills that have stayed with me.

Students should have the same option with regard to financial education. Because what they don’t know can hurt them a lot more down the road than not knowing how to thread a needle.