Finance education is becoming a larger part of formal learning in the United States. In 2024, 35 states required a personal finance course for high school graduation, while 28 required economics. At the same time, PISA 2022 results show that students’ exposure to financial concepts, financial products, and real-world money decisions remains uneven. These finance education statistics connect policy, classroom learning, student behavior, and adult outcomes.
Contents
- School requirements in the United States
- What students learn and remember
- Financial literacy performance
- Money behavior and access to financial products
- Confidence, motivation, and real-world experience
- The global financial education landscape
- Adult and digital financial literacy
- Financial education and financial marketing
School requirements in the United States
The Council for Economic Education’s 2024 Survey of the States shows a substantial expansion of required personal finance instruction. Thirty-five states required students to take a personal finance course to graduate from high school. That was 12 more states than in 2022. The new requirements were expected to give more than 10 million additional K–12 students guaranteed access to personal finance education, equivalent to 21% of current U.S. high school students.
Economics requirements were also widespread, though less common than personal finance requirements. Twenty-eight states required a course in economics for high school graduation in 2024. The two subjects overlap, but they are not interchangeable: economics generally examines markets and broader systems, while personal finance focuses more directly on individual decisions involving income, spending, saving, borrowing, and investing.
Course intensity differs considerably among states. Fifteen states required a semester-long personal finance course, which the Council for Economic Education describes as its gold standard. A semester course provides a more defined instructional experience than a brief unit embedded in another subject, although the statistics do not establish how consistently each course is delivered or assessed.
What students learn and remember
The OECD United States factsheet for PISA 2022 financial literacy reports how often 15-year-old students said they had learned financial terms in school and still knew them. Familiarity was highest for everyday concepts: 75% reported learning about a budget and still knowing the term, 74% said the same for a debit card, and 70% for a bank loan.
More specialized investment and financial-planning terms were less familiar. Thirty-one percent reported learning about return on investment and still knowing the term. The corresponding figures were 25% for exchange rate, 22% for compound interest, 19% for depreciation, 19% for pension plan, 19% for dividend, and 13% for diversification. These results describe reported exposure and retained familiarity, not independent tests of mastery.
Students also reported exposure to practical decision-making tasks. In the United States, 65% said they were sometimes or often exposed to tasks about the difference between spending money on needs and wants. Sixty-one percent reported similar exposure to tasks about the purpose and uses of money.
The classroom subject where financial learning appeared varied. Thirty-nine percent of U.S. students saw personal finance-related tasks in mathematics classes, 34% saw at least one such task in social sciences classes, and 27% saw at least one in economics or business classes. The differences suggest that finance education can be distributed across the curriculum rather than confined to a single course.
Across OECD countries and economies participating in PISA 2022, 67% of students were exposed sometimes or often to tasks exploring needs and wants, and 64% saw tasks describing the purpose and uses of money. On average, 44% had seen personal finance-related tasks in mathematics classes. The U.S. figures for these three measures were 65%, 61%, and 39%, respectively.
| Reported learning exposure | United States | OECD average or participating group |
|---|---|---|
| Needs-versus-wants tasks | 65% | 67% |
| Purpose and uses of money | 61% | 64% |
| Personal finance tasks in mathematics | 39% | 44% |
Financial literacy performance
The OECD United States factsheet places U.S. student performance in the context of PISA 2022. In the United States, 13.5% of students were top performers at Level 5 in financial literacy. Mean U.S. financial literacy performance in 2022 was 18 score points higher than in 2015. Socio-economic status was associated with 10% of the variation in U.S. financial literacy performance.
Across the 14 OECD countries participating in the PISA 2022 financial literacy assessment, 11% of students were top performers and 18% were low performers, according to the OECD financial education topic page. The OECD’s PISA 2022 Results, Volume IV reports that 95% of students across those 14 OECD countries were proficient at Level 1 or higher. Across all 20 participating countries and economies, 91% were proficient at Level 1 or higher.
These denominators matter. The 14-country OECD comparison and the 20-country-and-economy comparison are different groups, so their percentages should not be treated as one single worldwide result. Likewise, a Level 1-or-higher measure describes a minimum proficiency threshold; it does not mean that all students demonstrated advanced financial decision-making.
Money behavior and access to financial products
PISA 2022 also measured students’ financial experiences. In the United States, 49% of 15-year-old students reported holding an account at a bank, building society, post office, or credit union. Fifty-two percent reported holding a payment card or debit card. Students who held an account scored 17 points higher in financial literacy than those without one. This is an association in the assessment data, not evidence that holding an account by itself caused the higher score.
Digital commerce was common. Ninety-one percent of U.S. students reported buying something online during the prior 12 months. Buying something online was associated with a 44-point increase in financial literacy performance. As with the account comparison, the figure describes an association between a reported experience and assessment performance.
Price comparison and social influence were also prominent. Seventy-seven percent of U.S. students said they sometimes or always compared prices in different shops before buying with allowance money. Sixty-three percent reported buying something because friends had it during the prior 12 months. Eighty-seven percent said they could independently decide what to spend their money on.
The student population represented in the U.S. factsheet included 24% with an immigrant background in 2022. That context is relevant when interpreting national percentages, because student experiences and access to financial products can differ across social and demographic groups.
Confidence, motivation, and real-world experience
Financial education is shaped by what students do with money as well as what they encounter in class. In the United States, 86% of students received gifts of money from friends or relatives at least once a year. Half received an allowance or pocket money at least once a year without chores. Forty-two percent earned money from working outside school hours, and 45% earned money from occasional informal jobs such as babysitting.
Students reported mixed levels of interest. Fifty-three percent said they enjoyed talking about money matters, while 34% said money matters were not relevant for them right now. Even so, 81% felt confident about their ability to manage money. Confidence is a self-reported attitude and should be distinguished from measured financial literacy performance.
Together, these figures show why finance education can be relevant before students become full-time earners. Allowances, gifts, informal work, online purchases, and peer influence all create opportunities to practice choices about prices, needs, wants, and payment methods. The data do not quantify the quality of those decisions, but they do show that many students already encounter financial situations outside school.
The global financial education landscape
National policy activity extends beyond the United States. The OECD’s PISA 2022 Results, Volume IV reported that, as of 2024, more than 80 countries said they were developing or implementing a national strategy for financial literacy. A related OECD policy handbook on national strategies for financial education stated that 59 economies worldwide were implementing national strategies for financial education.
The figures use different wording and should be read as separate measures. “Developing or implementing” includes countries at either stage, while “implementing” refers to the narrower group described as putting a national strategy into operation. Neither figure is a forecast of future adoption.
The international evidence base also includes adults. The OECD/INFE 2023 International Survey of Adult Financial Literacy covered 39 countries and economies, including 20 OECD member countries and eight G20 countries. Its coverage provides a broad comparison, but it is not a census of every country or economy.
Adult and digital financial literacy
Adult results indicate that access to finance education remains an international challenge after compulsory schooling. The OECD Consumer Finance Risk Monitor 2026, citing the OECD/INFE 2023 survey, reported that only 34% of adults reached the minimum target financial literacy score of 70 out of 100. The average adult financial literacy score across participating jurisdictions was 60.
Digital money skills were weaker for many adults. Only 38% of adults who managed financial products and services online reached the minimum target digital financial literacy score, according to the same OECD monitor. Separately, the OECD digital financial literacy report 2025 reported that among adults who bought goods and services online, 40% did not reach the minimum target digital financial literacy score.
These statistics measure different groups and thresholds. The 38% figure concerns adults managing financial products and services online, while the 40% figure concerns adults who bought goods and services online and reports the share below the target. They should not be combined or treated as direct opposites.
Financial education and financial marketing
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau report on financial education and marketing compared estimated U.S. spending on consumer education with financial marketing. The CFPB found that for every $1 spent on financial education, $25 was spent on financial marketing. It estimated annual financial marketing spending at approximately $17 billion and annual spending on financial education at approximately $670 million.
The same report estimated that financial institutions spent about $54 per person per year on financial marketing, compared with only about $2 per person per year on educating consumers financially. These are estimates of annual spending, not measures of student achievement or proof that marketing determines a person’s financial choices.
The spending comparison gives finance education a broader business-learning context. Students are learning in an environment where financial products are actively promoted, while structured consumer education receives a much smaller estimated investment. The school-requirement statistics show expanded access to instruction; the literacy and behavior statistics show why access, retention, practical experience, and digital capability all remain important measures of finance education.