Financial Literacy Self-Evaluation of Young People in Latvia

Abstract

Regular and proportionate voluntary savings in private pension funds can become an important part of oldage pensions. However, this can happen if the savings are made for a long period of time. This justifies the target group of the 3rd pension level, which are young people who have started to receive a regular income from their professional activity. One of the most discussed issues in promoting voluntary pension savings is the level of financial literacy. In addition to other motivating factors, such as financial incentives, the level of knowledge of the population about the opportunities to participate in the third pillar of pensions makes them want to build up voluntary savings. Effective communication of information to a precise target audience is one of the main tasks of government agencies in formulating pension policy. In order to assess the impact of various socio-economic factors on young people's knowledge of savings for pension formation, a survey of Latvian youth was conducted in February-March 2021, addressing youth organizations and universities. The survey is designed using closed and semi-closed questions, in several questions respondents were asked to provide ratings using the Likert scale. The survey provides answers to the question about the level of knowledge of Latvian youth about the current pension system, emphasizing the investor's right to handle investments in private pension funds, as well as the basic conditions for creating savings at the 2nd and 3rd pension levels. The task of the study was to analyze the respondents' financial literacy self-evaluation answers based on the main socio-economic factors - gender, age and income. The results of the study confirm that the level of financial literacy of young people differs according to age, gender and income level.