This is financial literacy month in Canada. It couldn’t come at a more perfect time than when the federal government is introducing its first budget.
One of the themes this year centers on financial literacy for women. And a study prepared by the federal Financial Consumer Agency with support from Carleton University discovered that women underestimate their own financial knowledge.
They tested just over 1,100 women to assess their financial acuity. Going into it, they asked the participants to guess how many questions they’d get right. It turns out they under-estimated their own knowledge by 23-percent.
In short, they are less financially confident than men and this is important because financial confidence leads to better financial choices as well as planning such as budgeting, saving and credit decisions.
The study also showed that within a month of receiving some guidance, confidence levels moved up sharply. Worries over money also fell quickly.
Even those in the control group who received no guidance showed improved confidence levels suggesting that simply talking about money can actually be beneficial.
