Financial Literacy Course for NYS High School Students | 2023 NYS Legislative Agenda
The City Bar supports legislation to require successful completion of a personal financial literacy course for all New York State high school students in order to graduate from high school in the state. Such a course should include, among other topics, instruction in automobile, homeowner/renters, health and life insurance, banking, borrowing, credit, and responsible retirement investing. Only a few of these topics are consistently taught in New York despite the fact they provide essential education needed in order to be productive individuals in a complex world. Without a required, separate course in personal financial literacy, virtually no high school graduates in New York will know, for example, that a standard homeowners insurance policy will not cover damage from flooding, or that a standard auto policy will not cover them if they have an accident while driving for Uber, or how to improve their credit score, or how to prudently borrow for college, or how to economically purchase or lease a car, or how to profitably save for retirement. Many internet-based educational tools already exist to comprehensively teach financial literacy, so it should not be onerous or expensive for educational leaders and stakeholders to vet and implement a personal financial literacy curriculum. We believe that as lawyers we have a responsibility to promote greater understanding by consumers of financial services, which a panoply of federal and state laws extensively regulate.
– New for 2023 –
