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Self-Efficacy is Biggest Factor in Financial Well-Being
From the National Endowment for Financial Education® (NEFE®), May 21, 2018
New Findings Issued from Decade-Long Research
Financial self-efficacy* is a better predictor of financial well-being more than race, gender and socioeconomic background, according to a landmark 10-year study.
The Arizona Pathways to Life Success for University Students (APLUS) project has followed the same group of young adults from their first year in college through adulthood to measure how financial capability relates to happiness. The latest wave marks the fifth time APLUS participants have been surveyed since they started college as freshmen in 2008.
Now approaching age 30, APLUS participants show few differences in their achievement of adult milestones such as completing education, finding work and leaving the parental home. However, some groups are thriving more than others. Financial self-efficacy (e.g., confidence in one’s ability to perform financial tasks, such as paying bills) is a stronger indicator of positive well-being over race, gender, socioeconomic level or first-generation college status, according to the study funded by the National Endowment for Financial Education® (NEFE®).
∗ Wikipedia defines Self-efficacy as… an individual’s belief in his or her innate ability to achieve goals.
Parents’ Role in Financial Self-Efficacy
Although many APLUS participants continue to rely on their parents for financial knowledge and support, the study finds that receiving financial assistance from family is linked to lower well-being, even in participants from higher socioeconomic backgrounds.
“Self-efficacy isn’t defined as just having knowledge and skills, but believing in success as long as you try,” says Ted Beck, NEFE president and CEO. “That confidence develops from performing financial tasks on your own—not relying on your parents to do it for you.”
Self-assessed financial efficacy dropped for everyone in this wave of data collection, however men continued to rate themselves higher than women, a trend seen throughout the study.
“Perhaps as they face more complex financial decisions about housing, retirement and health insurance, young adults’ confidence wavers,” Beck says. “It’s important for parents to focus more on sharing information and less on sharing money during these key transitions to adulthood.”
Gender Differences in Self-Efficacy
Men and women tend to consult the same types of resources when seeking financial information, but in the opposite order. While men first go to websites, then ask their employers, and only then consult their parents. Women start with their parents, then their employers, and only then turn to the internet. Men also tend to check more sources.
Overall, men seem to be doing slightly better:
• Men show slightly higher objective financial knowledge in this wave, despite being equal with women earlier in the study.
• Men’s self-assessed knowledge of retirement accounts was 19 percent higher than women’s.
• Although men and women are equally employed, men earn significantly more—45 percent of men in the study earned $60,000 annually compared to only 27 percent of women.
• Women are more likely to have a second job.
• Women are more likely to receive financial help from family.
“Women seem to be more relationship oriented as they seek information, while men are more likely to investigate on their own. This could be a key factor in higher confidence among men,” adds Beck, who is retiring from NEFE after 13 years.
“In addition to offering timely and relevant information around milestones like home buying and workplace benefits, the financial education field must use data to shape experiences for multiple learning styles, and scale these through online learning environments,” says Billy Hensley, Ph.D., newly-named president and CEO of NEFE. Hensley has served as senior director of education with NEFE for the past eight years.
Perception vs. Reality
Self-efficacy requires belief in your own abilities, but unfortunately some groups don’t see themselves accurately:
• First-generation college students performed better than their peers in objective financial knowledge, yet they reported feeling less confident and capable.
• Actual knowledge for all socioeconomic groups remained similar, but lower socioeconomic groups ranked their self-assessed knowledge much lower.
• Hispanics’ self-assessed knowledge dropped significantly in this wave.
“Data is crucial, not just for educators and policymakers, but for individuals. Seeing the raw numbers would show some groups are doing better than they think,” Beck says. “Accurate assessment of one’s progress can be a confidence booster.”
“Learners will shape the educational world of the future through data, and individuals will be able to use their own personal information to improve themselves,” Hensley says. “Self-efficacy begins by seeing clearly where you are and actively participating in your financial life.”
For complete findings of the research, click here.
Study Details
The landmark study, Arizona Pathways to Life Success for University Students (APLUS), launched in the spring of 2008 with 2,098 University of Arizona freshmen. Researchers followed and surveyed the participants five times from 2008-2016. The principal investigators are Joyce Serido, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, and Soyeon Shim, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison. Detailed reports on findings from each wave are available at https://www.aplushappiness.org.
About the National Endowment for Financial Education (NEFE)
NEFE is a nonprofit foundation that inspires empowered financial decision making for individuals and families through every stage of life. For more information, visit www.nefe.org.
How do you maintain good credit?
How do you continue to maintain good credit? Your credit report acts as your financial references when you apply for any new credit. The only way to maintain a good credit history is to use credit wisely.
Tips for Building Credit
Following are 10 tried and true tips for building credit:
1. Create a spending plan and live within it. Credit should not be used to live beyond your means. Borrowing now means paying back from future earnings in that future budget.
2. Provide complete, accurate, and consistent identification on your credit applications. This information helps set up your credit history correctly from the beginning, ensures that your new accounts will be matched to the correct report, and minimizes the chance that your credit file will be incomplete.
3. Pay your bills on time, all of the time. Late payments, called delinquencies, negatively affect your ability to get credit since they indicate a stronger likelihood that you will make late payments again or will be unable to pay your debts in the future. 35% of your credit score is determined by your payment history.
It Pays to Have Some Credit
4. Have some credit, but not too much. Having no credit history is almost as bad as having a negative credit history, and you only need a few accounts reported to the credit reporting companies to demonstrate credit management.
5. Have a mixture of credit types. It is good to have a history of repaying an installment loan, but a revolving account demonstrates more clearly that you can responsibly manage credit. 10% of your credit score is built on the types of credit you currently have in use.
6. Keep credit card balances low. Keeping your balances low compared with credit limits shows that you aren’t tempted to charge more than you can pay. By charging a small amount on at least one card and paying the balance on time, you will show that you can handle larger amounts of available credit.
Closing Credit Accounts Isn’t Always Good
7. Use caution when closing accounts. Closing an account isn’t always a good thing. It can result in an increase to your balance-to-limit ratio, making you appear to be an increased credit risk. Another key factor of your credit score is how much of your capacity are you using? Closing accounts will reduce your capacity by the amount of the credit limit closed. 30% of your score is dependent upon using a little, but not all of your potential borrowing capacity.
8. Be aware of your debt-to-income ratio. Mortgage lenders consider your monthly payments compared with your monthly income. As a practical matter, higher levels of debt compared to income increases stress.
9. Demonstrate stability. Some creditors consider your length of employment, length of residence, whether you own or rent, and if you have any savings in making credit decisions.
10. Contact your lenders if you fall behind on your payments. Many lenders will work with you to set up a different payment schedule or interest rate. Whatever you do, keep the channels of communication open.
How To Get Your Credit Report
You can order your credit report free. Each year, you can request one credit report from each of the major credit bureaus without charge. In some situations you can request them more frequently. To learn more, and order, visit www.annualcreditreport.com.
Getting and maintaining a good credit score takes consistent effort. It’s well worth it, and will pay benefits for a lifetime.
Americans Unable to Cope in an Emergency?
From the National Endowment for Financial Education® (NEFE®), April16, 2018
1 in 3 Americans are Financially Fragile
Research funded by the National Endowment for Financial Education® (NEFE®), and conducted by the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center at the George Washington University, identifies a widespread problem affecting millions of Americans. The recent study finds one in three Americans are financially fragile, meaning they are unable to cope with emergency expenses in a short time frame.
Using survey data and focus group discussion findings, researchers assessed responses focused on financial preparedness—specifically respondents’ confidence that they could come up with $2,000 within a month’s time if needed for an emergency. Individuals answering that they certainly could not or probably not come up with that amount of money in that timeframe are considered financially fragile. The analysis found that one in three (36 percent) respondents in the 2015 National Financial Capability Study (NFCS) fall within this vulnerable group.
“It’s inevitable that a person will experience a financial setback or an income disruption during their lifetime,” says Billy Hensley, Ph.D., senior director of education at NEFE. “If you’re getting money back from Uncle Sam this tax season, consider investing this windfall toward starting or growing an emergency savings fund.”
Financially fragile Americans could not cover the cost of a midsize shock, such as a medical bill, car or house repair within a reasonable amount of time, in the case of this study one month. This number has dropped since 2009 during the Great Recession, when nearly 50 percent of working-age adults were considered financially fragile. Still, the prevalence of unsteady personal finances is concerning.
What causes financial fragility?
Researchers investigated the causes of financial fragility and found three main factors: high debt, lack of assets, and low financial literacy.
“Financial fragility does not mean simply lack of precautionary savings,” says Annamaria Lusardi, Ph.D., academic director of GFLEC. “Both sides of households’ balance sheet matter; heavy indebtedness can also make individuals financially fragile.”
Higher income does not always protect against financial fragility.
Not surprisingly, the majority of financially fragile people are in the low-income bracket. Yet almost 30 percent of middle-income households (annual income in the $50–75k range) and 20 percent of high-income households (annual income $75–100k) also are considered financially fragile.
“The contrast of a $2,000 emergency expense in comparison to higher-income levels is striking,” says Hensley. “Among lower-income individuals and families, most rely, due to the limits of financial liquidity, on borrowing from their network of friends and family or working multiple jobs. Unfortunately, financially fragile households are less likely to have a precautionary safety net.”
Financial fragility and retirement.
Financial fragility is shown to make people vulnerable not only in the short term, but also in the long term, as financially fragile individuals are less likely to plan for their retirement.
Fragility impacts all age groups. Financial fragility does not seem to decrease with age. People of all age groups are financially fragile at comparable levels, despite the expectation that people earn more money as they get older.
Education and gender decrease fragility risk. The higher the education level, the lower the probability of being financially fragile. Also at risk are women, a substantially higher proportion of working-age women are financially fragile relative to men.
“Financial fragility is a multifaceted problem facing a wide representation of the American population,” says Hensley. “We urge everyone to consider the unique factors in their life and prioritize their finances accordingly to work toward long-term financial goals.”
“Initiatives such as incentivizing short-term savings and requiring financial education in school and the workplace can be important steps toward increasing financial resilience,” Lusardi adds.
For more on the financial fragility research, click here.
Study Details
This research analyzed data from two national surveys—the 2015 National Financial Capability Study (NFCS) conducted by the FINRA Investor Education Foundation, and the 2015 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED) conducted by the U.S. Federal Reserve Board, as well as data collected from focus groups. The study was led by Annamaria Lusardi, Ph.D., academic director of the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center (GFLEC); Andrea Hasler, Ph.D., assistant research professor in financial literacy at GFLEC; and Raveesha Gupta and Noemi Oggero, research associates at GFLEC.
About the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center (GFLEC)
Founded in 2011 at the George Washington University School of Business, the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center (GFLEC) has positioned itself to be the world’s leading center for financial literacy research and policy. Through rigorous scholarship and research, wide-reaching education, and global policy services, the Center works with partners in Washington, D.C., throughout the United States, and across the globe to raise the level of financial knowledge. For more information, visit www.gflec.org.
About the National Endowment for Financial Education (NEFE)
NEFE is a nonprofit foundation that inspires empowered financial decision making for individuals and families through every stage of life. For more information, visit www.nefe.org.