Improving Financial Literacy

The effectiveness of disclosure is an ongoing discussion on this blog and not long ago we had an engaging online symposium on Omri Ben-Shahar and Carl Schneider’s thought-provoking book, More Than You Wanted to Know:  The Failure of Mandated Disclosure.  Lauren Willis and Theresa Amato have written an op-ed in today’s LA Times that gets to the heart of the failures of disclosures (and related informational problems) when it comes to consumer literacy – and they offer some solutions.  I particularly like their suggestion that banks demonstrate that consumers understand the financial products offered.  This shifts the burden of disclosure from the consumers to the banks.  You can read more here.