Does Financial Education Affect Soldiers’ Financial Behavior?

Financial education does seem to have an effect on specific financial management behaviors. Simple bivariate analyses revealed several behavior impacts. With more robust mulitvariate analysis, soldiers taking the financial education program were more likely than the comparison group to report using informal spending plans and less likely to report using formal spending plans. We also found that high school financial education programs made a difference in selected behaviors: those who had a high school financial education course were more likely to have a savings account for short-term savings goals and to save regularly. Having taken a high school course was also associated with having paid an overdraft fee in the past six months. Early financial management experience also seems to matter: soldiers who had a high school savings account were more likely to have an emergency fund, more likely to read money management articles, and less likely to "never" pay off their credit card balances. Limitations of this study are noted at the end of this report.