Money coach proposes mandatory financial education at Maltese schools 

Money coach Luca Caruana has proposed mandatory financial education at secondary schools.

This is one of five proposals Mr Caruana released as part of a financial wellness manifesto in the run-up to the Maltese general election. 

“By the time a Maltese child reaches adulthood, they have spent over twelve years in formal education,” Mr Caruana said. 

“In those twelve years they will have learned how to calculate the area of a triangle. They will not have learned what a pension is, how compound interest works, what a credit score means, how to read a payslip, or how inflation erodes their savings.”

“They leave school entirely unprepared for the most universal adult responsibility they will ever face.”

As an example, Mr Caruana recounted how he met a professional couple in their late thirties who had saved €50,000 in a bank account over the years, unaware that their savings could have multiple had they invested them in a diversified ETF portfolio instead.

“Nobody had ever told this couple that leaving money in a savings account with near-zero interest means losing money in real terms every single year to inflation. They did not know. Nobody had taught them. That is not a personal failure. That is a systemic one,” he said. 

Mr Caruana said financial education could take the form of a compulsory standalone secondary school subject, covering topics like earning, saving, investing, borrowing, pensions, digital payments, scams and emotional money habits, with simulated real-world challenges included. 

Alternatively, it could be embedded across existing subjects, in which case students would learn about budgeting and interest in Maths, consumer rights in Social Studies and financial storytelling in English. 

He said this would require a national continuing professional development programme to equip teachers with the necessary skills, in partnership with financial literacy institutions. 

In addition, Mr Caruana proposed financial literacy modules at MCAST, the University of Malta and adult education centres, as well as a government-funded Maltese financial literacy platform, gamified for secondary school students.

In his manifesto, Mr Caruana also proposed the establishment of a national financial wellness office that offers citizens impartial financial advice free of charge, and the automatic enrolment of workers into a private pension scheme, with the freedom to opt out. 

He also proposed a tax-advantaged “first-time investor incentive scheme”, similar to the UK’s Individual Savings Account scheme, to give people alternative pathways to wealth besides purchasing property. 

“Property cannot be the only path to wealth. A government-backed incentive for first-time investors opens a second door,” he said. 

Photo: moneycoachinghub.com