Personal Finance News
Survey Finds Lack of Financial Literacy Costs Adults $948 a Year
The latest survey from the National Financial Educators Council (NFEC) puts a dollar figure on financial literacy failings.
About the NFEC Survey Results:
Each year, the NFEC asks U.S. adults: “During the past year, about how much money do you think you lost because you lacked knowledge about personal finances?” In 2025, when averaging the 1,200 responses, the organization estimates that individuals lost $948 during the year due to a gap in their money knowledge. Extrapolating that result, it’s estimated that Americans lost more than $260 million in total.
The good news is that this figure is down significantly from recent years. In fact, it makes the fourth consecutive decrease in the average. In 2022, the cited average was $1,819, falling to $1,506 in 2023 and $1,015 in 2024.
Making up that average, 17.67% of respondents reported losing between $1,000 and $2,499 while 10.25% say they lost $2,500 to $9,999. Another 4.33% admit to losses totaling more than $10,000 during the year. By comparison, during the record high year of 2022, 23.02% said their totals were at least $2,500.
What They’re Saying:
Commenting on the 2025 survey results, NFEC CEO Vince Shorb said, “Americans today need financial education more than ever before. Financial illiteracy has become an epidemic in this country.”
Shorb continued, “We need to start teaching comprehensive financial education to children early in life, so that all Americans have the knowledge they need to make the financial decisions they’ll face in the changing economic world. Our future depends on it.”
My Thoughts:
Since the NFEC report is a single-question survey, it does not elaborate on the specific reasons why Americans say their lack of knowledge costs them money. However, my guess is that a good amount of these losses are due to high-interest debt on credit cards and certain loans.
On the other end, consumers could be missing out on being paid interest by either keeping all of their funds in a checking account or with a bank with low APYs on savings accounts. Whatever the cause, it’s unfortunate that people are losing such a significant amount of money due to these mistakes.
On the upside, it is encouraging to see this total reaching a new low. This isn’t necessarily surprising given the growing number of free financial literacy resources available today. Nevertheless, let’s hope that more and more adults are taking advantage of these tools and that we’ll see these annual figures continue to fall.
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