First-ever financial education textbook lands in schools - MSE News

Former_MSE_Steve_1
Former_MSE_Steve_1 Posts: 79 Forumite
Combo Breaker First Anniversary Newshound! Chutzpah Haggler
in Employment, jobseeking & training
All 3,400 state-funded secondary schools in England will get 100 free copies of a financial education textbook this week, thanks to a £325,000 donation from MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis...
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'First-ever financial education textbook lands in schools - funded by Martin'
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  • PasturesNew
    PasturesNew Posts: 70,698 Forumite
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    Personally I think a lot of stuff taught at schools goes in one ear and out the other. Kids won't see the relevance, it'll be "boring" .... and be forgotten.

    I think a lot of things that people shout "should be taught at schools" might be better received if there were some form of "continuing education" available to all adults and seen as "Skills for Life" for those 18+ when they're more able to understand the significance of information.

    Is this book also available, freely, as a downloadable PDF, or viewable online? Well, apparently it is, so that's a start. http://www.young-money.org.uk/textbook

    Just reading that article bored me to the core ... and I glazed over VERY quickly, so did not read even this article, on this site.

    It's a dull subject .....
  • pmduk
    pmduk Posts: 10,655 Forumite
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    It depends when it's taught, I remember most of my class being very intrigued about tax and NI when we were 15.
  • Fingerbobs
    Fingerbobs Posts: 1,637 Forumite
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    There's a grammar mistake on the back cover.
  • zagfles
    zagfles Posts: 20,317 Forumite
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    Excellent idea - well done Martin! Most people are incredibly ignorant of fairly simple financial issues, like how their taxes work, benefits, interest, mortgages etc. We teach kids maths, but not the application of maths to useful things like their finances.
  • zagfles
    zagfles Posts: 20,317 Forumite
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    PasturesNew wrote: »
    Personally I think a lot of stuff taught at schools goes in one ear and out the other. Kids won't see the relevance, it'll be "boring" .... and be forgotten.
    That could apply to anything taught in schools. Maths, English, foreign languages, geography, history etc. Kids would likely see more relevance in this than most other subjects, like trigonometry, the black death, Shakespeare etc.

    Of course some kids will find this boring, but probably the sort who'll find everything else taught in school boring and who'll end up with no qualifications and in a boring dead end low paid job, and end up with a lifetime of boredom because they found school boring. But those who actually what to achieve something with their lives will likely find this more interesting that a lot of subjects.
  • tacpot12
    tacpot12 Posts: 7,929 Forumite
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    The book is very good. I had a quick read of it via the link provided by PasturesNew.
    The comments I post are my personal opinion. While I try to check everything is correct before posting, I can and do make mistakes, so always try to check official information sources before relying on my posts.
  • gna
    gna Posts: 1 Newbie
    The content looks great. More than a few adults should read it as well!

    How can I check if my school is included in those receiving the free text book. As a Pupil referral unit we sometimes get missed off the list of high schools?

    Thanks
  • [Deleted User]
    [Deleted User] Posts: 0 Newbie
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    edited 10 November 2018 at 2:43PM
    Reading it as a PDF now. Looks great!
    Why is the textbook not being sent to Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish schools?
    The book is only being sent to schools in England because the book is mapped to the English curriculum.

    In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, schools follow different curricula.

    I really feel that text, both in the article, and on the Young Money website is a very weaselly non-explanation.

    If it's an English endeavour to help English kids then fine! Please just say that! The other nations have plenty of their own charities and no-one will complain (well there's always some).

    It's only when companies and organisations pretend to be British and then only make arrangements for people in England, that it gets annoying.
  • tim9333
    tim9333 Posts: 7 Forumite
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    Very impressed with Martin's efforts - I'm going to see if my local school would like any support with this.

    Worth noting that the compound interest calculation on page 30 looks like it has a typo?

    £5,000 (1.05 / 12) 12 (10)
    think it should be
    £5,000(1 + 0.05/12)12(10)
  • hiohaa
    hiohaa Posts: 44 Forumite
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    The section on Why we pay income tax is completely, and utterly wrong.
    This is a shocking piece of work and I will be contacting the publishers and creators of this textbook to rectify.

    It says
    "Today, Income Tax is the biggest individual source of income for the
    government and accounts for nearly 25% of government income. This,
    together with the income the government raises from other sources, is
    used to pay for all the various areas of government spending.
    Examples of government spending include:
    • Provision of State Pensions,
    low income support and
    Jobseeker’s Allowance
    • The National Health Service
    (NHS) – building hospitals,
    providing treatment and paying
    doctors and nurses
    • Spending on schools, colleges
    and universities
    • The Armed Forces – keeping
    the Army, Navy and Royal Air
    Force up to date with the latest
    technology, and paying the
    salaries of our military personnel
    • Local councils – providing
    services such as emptying your
    rubbish bins, cleaning the
    streets, etc.
    All of these services, and many more, are paid for by the government and
    to do so they must use the income that they receive from taxation. Not just
    Income Tax but also National Insurance, Value Added Tax (VAT), Council Tax,
    taxes on business profits, vehicle tax, and taxes on alcohol, cigarettes, etc"

    That simply is not true. None of that is.

    Taxes Do not Fund government spending. Government spending is part of the national GDP calculation, and government spending is another way of saying Someones income.
    When you pay your taxes, it doesn't get redirected to pay for some service. It goes back to the HM treasury and offsets a credit balance at the BoE.

    In much thesame way when you take out a personal loan with a bank, the Bank creates a deposit account on its liability side and a loan account on its asset side - and the money is created, out of nothing. They are accounting entries.

    The BoE themselves published in 2014 a document explaining how this actually works, and how new money is created.

    Taxes are used to redistribute wealth, to incentivise certain behaviours, and to take money out the economy to control inflation.

    They are not used to fund government services. If anyone can find my proof that Taxes are literally redirected to then pay for public services, I'd like to see evidence of it.
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