Question: Can Language Really Impact Savings Rates?
This post created by new NGPF team member, Christian Sherrill:
If you’re a rabid TED Talks fan, as I am, you’ll probably remember Yale Economist Keith Chen’s fascinating talk about the impact of grammar on savings behavior.
Now famously, Chen concluded that - well, I’ll let you learn about it on your own terms:
Video summary (5:53)
Full text of study: The Effect of Language on Economic Behavior: Evidence from Savings Rates, Health Behaviors, and Retirement...
NGPF Podcast: Tim Talks To USAA Product Designer, Vikram Parekh
By Tim Ranzetta
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Jul 16, 2017
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Behavioral Finance, Research, Investing, Savings, Podcasts, compound interest
I recently served on a panel with USAA’s Vikram Parekh at the Visa Financial Literacy Summit in Chicago. In my research for the panel, I discovered that Vikram has a really cool job at USAA, which is not your typical financial institution. Their customer base is drawn from military and their families and to say they are hyperfocused on their customers’ financial wellbeing is probably an understatement. You will hear how Vikram uses principles of behavioral finance to get...
Video: How Can We Overcome Our Behavioral Biases Against Saving?
By Tim Ranzetta
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Jul 12, 2017
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Behavioral Finance, Question of the Day, Savings, Current Events, Video Resource, Retirement
Hat tip to Vikram Parekh of USAA (podcast upcoming) for highlighting the work of one of his favorite behavioral economists, Shlomo Benartzi of UCLA’s Anderson School of Business. In this 17 minute TED video, Shlomo highlights the hurdles to saving and how he designed a savings program (“behavioral economics on steroids”) to overcome these challenges. He provides some good examples that you might use with your students to show how our behavioral biases cause us to fall short of...
NGPF FAVORITES: Our Best OFF TO COLLEGE Resources
By Tim Ranzetta
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Jul 07, 2017
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Activities, Credit Scores, Activity, Behavioral Finance, Career, Paying for College, Budgeting, Savings, Student Loans, Stocks, Current Events, Interactive
This month’s NGPF Favorites List comes from Sid Sharma – one of NGPF’s veteran “Power Interns” who has been with us for 3 years. Sadly, we will wish him well as he heads off to college this fall! We wanted Sid to reflect on his NGPF experience (he has literally “touched” every element in the NGPF curriculum) and highlight the resources that have enabled him to become the knowledgeable, action-oriented, process-innovator that he is today!...
What Are People Reading on the NGPF Blog?
By Tim Ranzetta
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Jun 26, 2017
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Behavioral Finance, Credit Cards, Investing, Savings, Checking Accounts, Current Events, Quizzes, compound interest, Cryptocurrencies, Retirement
Getting close to the end of June, so I thought it was worth checking our website analytics to see what new blog posts are garnering attention as the school year wound down in many parts of the country.
Here are the top 5:
What is Bitcoin and How Does Cryptocurrency Work?: A Primer; NGPF’s newest team member, Hari Vasu-Devan tackled this challenging topic by providing educators with information they can access when the inevitable student query comes, “Should I be investing in...
NGPF's Top 15 Activities, Courtesy of Jessica Endlich
By Tim Ranzetta
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Jun 06, 2017
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Activities, Activity, Budgeting, Personal Finance, Savings, Stocks, Video Resource, Case Study, Interactive
Given the comprehensive nature of our website (full disclosure: Sometimes I forget that we have certain projects/activities/data crunches/blog posts….), teachers often ask us “OK, but what are the best resources that you can recommend?” At that point, we typically turn to Jessica and she always has a few ideas to recommend. So, this month, we asked Jessica to provide us with her “Best of NGPF” specifically for the last days of school.
The responses we got from...
Question: What Is Your Most Valuable Asset Today?
By Tim Ranzetta
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May 03, 2017
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Article, Career, Research, Investing, Savings, Current Events, compound interest
Answer: You!
To a student with little in the way of financial assets, this is a critical question for them to answer. Why? Because it provides them with the right mindset as they are coming to conclusions about their post-high school life.
From “Of Dollars and Data,” one of my new favorite blogs:
Nearly all articles written about investment and personal finance (mine included) focus heavily on financial assets despite the fact that most of your value (like mine) is likely not...
Interactive: How Can I Retire Early?
By Tim Ranzetta
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Apr 30, 2017
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Savings, Activity, Behavioral Finance, Investing, Activities, compound interest, Interactive
As an educator, I often get this question from students. Yes, I know they have attention spans that are minute to minute (or text to text) but when the subject of retirement comes up, they usually fixate on “How can I get there as soon as possible?”
What I love about this post from Mr. Money Moustache (last seen on this blog in 2014), is the simplicity of his answer and how it all comes down to ONE factor:
Well, I have a surprise for you. It turns out that when it boils right down...
Chart: Could You Come Up with $400 In Case of An Emergency?
By Tim Ranzetta
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Apr 24, 2017
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Savings, Behavioral Finance, Question of the Day, Research, Current Events, Chart of the Week
From WSJ:
In 2015, we posted research indicating that 47% of Americans couldn’t come up with $400 in case of an emergency. These charts and data tables provide some additional context around that statistic. Questions for your students:
The pie chart indicates that 2/3 of households have roughly the same income from month to month. What might be some of the reasons why 1/3 of households have less predictable income streams?
In the second chart, 25% of households with incomes less than...
Article: Financial Advice From The Stars
By Tim Ranzetta
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Apr 23, 2017
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Article, Career, Personal Finance, Savings, Teaching Strategies, Current Events
We know how much young people look up to, mimic and try and emulate the stars. That’s why I thought this article might grab your students’ attention. Here are a few of the 11 stars that were mentioned (I have to admit that I am having a lot of “who’s that?” moments as I skim through the article, your students probably won’t).
From Bloomberg:
Jenny Slate (Comic, actress); Slate stars in the films Gifted (April) and Landline (July)
Have you made any big...
What's New In Financial Education Research?
By Tim Ranzetta
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Apr 20, 2017
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Behavioral Finance, Research, Personal Finance, Savings, Current Events
Hat tip to Brian Page for reminding me about the recent Cherry Blossom Financial Education Institute held in early April. Here’s a summary of a few of the papers that were presented that you might be interested in:
Adriaan Kalwij, Utrecht University: “The Effects of Financial Education on Financial Literacy and Savings Behavior: Evidence from a Controlled Field Experiment in Dutch Primary Schools”
Question it sought to answer: What is the short-term effect of a 45 minute financial...
What Are We Watching? Three Of Our Latest Curated Videos
By Tim Ranzetta
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Apr 18, 2017
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Checking Accounts, Research, Credit Cards, Savings, Debit Cards, Payment Types, Teaching Strategies
The NGPF Team is always scouring the web for videos to add to our Video Library. Here are the latest that the team has uncovered:
Pay Day 101: Direct Deposit (from Young Illinois Saves), duration of 3:48, provides a good description of how direct deposit works from the perspective of young adults:
Questions:
In your own words, what is Direct Deposit?
How can you set up Direct Deposit?
Is Direct Deposit safe?
What are the benefits?
Which of the benefits of Direct Deposit means the most to you?
...
Question: Can You Really Build Wealth Earning The Minimum Wage?
Thought-provoking infographic from Visual Capitalist. I like the question because the knee jerk reaction to the question would be “of course not.” The infographic lists 10 ways to be able to build wealth while earning a low wage. Frankly these tips work for people at all income strata which is why I am including it here. Some questions for your students:
What cost item is most important in influencing your ability to create wealth?
Would you consider the area you live to be a cheap...
Resource Lists for Financial Educators (courtesy of Barbara O'Neill of Rutgers Cooperative Extension)
By Tim Ranzetta
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Mar 28, 2017
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Activities, Credit Scores, Career, Paying for College, Research, Budgeting, Credit Cards, Identity Theft, Personal Finance, Investing, Mutual Funds, Savings, WebQuest, Financial Literacy, Student Loans, Checking Accounts, Debit Cards, Payment Types, Stocks, Current Events, Insurance, Video Resource, Case Study, Credit Reports, Employment, Quizzes, Entrepreneurship
What does a distinguished professor do during her sabbatical? Curate personal finance resources, of course! In this blog post, Barbara O’Neill shares the fruits of her hundreds of hours of labor in putting together three awesome resource lists (see bottom of post for links to her lists), including what what she considered the “best of the best” from the NGPF library. As she describes below, the purpose of her odyssey was to replenish her “well” of creative...
Spanish Translations for Saving & Investing
Did you know that one of our most popular projects at the moment is Ravioli Den (technically called Joining the Market)? Did you know it is now available in Spanish (Unirse al mercado de valores)? NGPF is in the process of translating some of our best and most-used activities and projects into Spanish, so that teachers with English Language Learners in their classes can further support their students. This month we’re releasing 10 translations on the topics of Saving and Investing.
You can...
