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[Music]
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welcome to the state of financial
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Wellness for Hispanic Americans with the
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Tia Institute I am farita Griffith the
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managing director for the Coalition for
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equity and opportunity to celebrate
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Hispanic Heritage Month we are
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recognizing the contributions and
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influences of Hispanic Americans to the
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nation's achievements culture and
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history I happy to be joined by Seria
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Kori head of Tia Institute and Professor
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David Musto of the Wharton School Sera
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is recognized as a thought leader in
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retirement and healthy aging research
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and sits on the Wharton pension research
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Council and holds a MBA from the Wharton
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School David is the Ronald o Pearlman
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professor in finance the director of the
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Steven Center for Innovation and finance
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a member of the Wharton Coalition for
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equity and opportunity faculty Advisory
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Board and conceptualize the fivers app
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that we are going to discuss today
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geared to serving under ource
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communities okay so let's jump into this
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important conversation Seria can you
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share why the Tia Institute is
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interested in and cares deeply about
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focusing on Hispanic communities
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according to the Tia Institute and
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Stanford's Global financial literacy
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Excellence Center annual pen index
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survey Hispanic personal finance
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knowledge is typically lower than the
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overall US population what are some
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factors that contribute to this
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disparity and financial
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literacy thank you so much on behalf of
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the ti Institute and all my colleagues
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at Tia to join this conversation with
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you and Professor mustto uh uh we became
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deeply interested in this topic as you
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rightly mentioned we focus on the topic
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of retirement and naturally along with
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that
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longevity uh and U as we started
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studying the topic uh particularly
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through the pandemic uh we saw lots of
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disparities
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in how the longevity of folks between
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males and females between different
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races and ethnicities and then when you
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go to the Social Security Administration
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and start collecting data on social
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security income across these various
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demographic groups you see a lot of
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disparity as well so it's not a one-size
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fitall conversation so we need to
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understand these different demographic
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groups deeply and to your point uh one
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of the
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uh areas that we have kind of done a lot
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of research is around uh retirement
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preparedness and financial preparedness
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and if you ask then why do we see these
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differences I'm sure Professor must
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would agree with me there are things
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like barriers structural barriers
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language barriers access to education
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Access to Health Care uh maybe even in
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our study recently that we did on
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Hispanic and Hispanic Financial Wellness
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maybe some cultural distrust elements
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all these things lead to a kind of a
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focus and understanding of what's
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happening with our Hispanic Latino
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population and I'll close with this
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research Point uh and turn it back to
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you so what we found in our researches
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about uh over
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onethird of Hispanic Americans were not
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able to answer more than seven questions
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correctly in an administered
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questionnaire is in assessing financial
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literacy um and that was double the rate
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of white Caucasian population and then
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similarly we also found that um 38%
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let's call it 4 and 10 had weak
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longevity literacy and this is an
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important point I want to just make
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which is if you look at longevity by
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demographic group Hispanic Latino
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females are the second longest living in
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the US and therefore it would be
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troubling to say longevity literacy is
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low because then that population is
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incurring longevity risk meaning they
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could outlive their savings so these are
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all the reasons fra why we care deeply
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about this topic and some of these
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findings thank you so much for just
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highlighting that those demographics and
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saying you know this not a one-size fits
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all because I think that's a really good
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um point to make and I do want to let
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the audience know that we will provide
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the link for the report by the TA Tia
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Institute on the podcast website so
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building on that work U that Tia
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Institute is doing uh regarding
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Financial Wellness for Hispanic
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Americans David can you share a bit more
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about um what inspired the development
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of the ferse app the app that High
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School interns um at the Wharton Stevens
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Center for Innovation developed to
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determine the real cost of college
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particularly and why it is important to
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involve high school students in its
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creation especially those from
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underrepresented groups like uh the
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histic uh communities oh thanks for
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thanks for having me and um well first
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why did we start this app two things to
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say one is well we the center launched
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five years ago and right away we asked
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ourselves well what is a way we could
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reach out to the community something
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that was grounded in uh Finance
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scholarship what academics do all day
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and then what would be useful to the
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community and student student loans was
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the first thing that came to mind here's
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a huge financial decision you have to
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make before you've made maybe any other
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real financial decision or anyone that
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really would come to mind and uh so it's
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a big decision and it it's not it's big
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but it's it's multi-dimensional in a way
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that's kind of hard to wrap your mind
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around you take out a loan and then you
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go to school and then good and bad
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things can happen and you get the job
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you don't get the job all sorts of
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things can happen down the road which by
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the way is why we called it ferse
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because ferse the idea was it's Finance
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in the Multiverse that was the idea that
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that you take out alone you make a
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financial decision and then all these
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universes in some sense Branch out um
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from this one and uh you want to maybe
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take a one fact from each of those
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universes that could happen and collect
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those and present them as a as a as a
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probability distribution the diversity
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of things that could happen
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because you did because you took out
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this loan and then you look at that you
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think about it you ask yourself what is
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you look at the risk and you ask
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yourself well is this is this right for
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me or not and you can ask that about
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different schools that cost different
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amounts and different careers you could
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pursue and so on so it's it's it's a way
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to take that unwieldy financial decision
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and make it a little more uh digestible
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so that's one thing and then the other
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is uh just to you bring high school
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students to campus in in exercise in
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entrepreneurship it's it's an
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entrepreneurship in every way except
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there's no there's no pot of gold at the
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end of the rainbow right warrant's not
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charging for this uh the students are
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supported they're supported by a federal
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program called the work ready program
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and so they actually get a little
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stipend for the campus uh that's you
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your tax dollars at good work I believe
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and um and and they all come from that's
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means tested right so they all come from
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lower income families and anyhow they
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it's been a great time this semester we
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have 81 81 high school students coming
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here uh Tuesday so tomorrow is the first
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day to Tuesday uh evenings coming from
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something come communic almost an hour
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to our campus you know from Northeast
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far away to join us and we have all
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these different teams and so it's just a
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lot of fun for all of us thank you so
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much for just um giving us a little bit
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of insight into this work I think um as
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I hear you talk I hear access I hear a
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conversation about why this is important
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and giving them tools right um practical
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tools that will have real life
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implications yeah I and you know here's
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one very like the lowest hanging fruit
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of all is um income driven repayment
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which is a very generous Federal program
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that shares a lot of the risk if if you
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if you swing for the fences I want to do
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something and maybe it doesn't work out
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it's a very risky hard job to get or
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whatever you bad things can happen which
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is part of why we made this app is to
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sort of bring to you you know the good
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things bad things can happen but with
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income driven repayment a lot of the
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downside is borne uh through this
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Federal program and because it is that's
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one more reason to to take that risk
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right but if you don't know that in
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advance then it has no effect on the
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risk you take you don't know you don't
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you don't know about in advance it
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doesn't affect your your decision and so
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and we've learned in our interaction
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with high schools very few high school
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students know anything about income
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deriver repayment might ask a room full
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of kids even at a magnet school here in
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Philly that attracts very ambitious
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students and maybe you know two hands go
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up that they know what it is and so just
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that's that's the lowest hanging fruit
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of all just to show people income driven
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repayment and show how it's going to
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affect uh their repayment going forward
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so can we build on that a bit and talk a
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bit about the work that the Institute
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Tia Institute is doing to think about
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finan
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Wellness for Hispanic Americans um so as
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I think about the work that um surria
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and his team is doing the report found
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that uh roughly 5% um roughly 5% less
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incidents of student loan debt is taken
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by Hispanic Americans so that is an
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average about
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$15,000 um and but amount of uh student
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loan does not equate to a higher number
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of um liquid assets um and so s I'm just
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wondering if you could speak a little
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bit about how Hispanic Americans are
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managing to enter adulthood with less uh
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student loan debt but we're not seeing
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um any information that kind of gives us
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a in uh insight into whether or not we
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see higher um uh liquid assets it's a
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perplexing finding indeed uh but I did I
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did want to say that the app that David
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described um is such a Leap Forward into
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this improving of this financial
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literacy through a practical application
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uh that I'm pretty excited to hear about
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this and wish great success in its roll
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out uh on this question for about U
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loans you know I think as I think about
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this finding maybe we can discuss the
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what as opposed to the why the why is
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going to take a little more research uh
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but here are a couple of guesses one is
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uh and as an Asian-American can kind of
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relate to this propensity that parents
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are very invested in the education of
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their next generation and maybe even
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them taking on loans or home loans and
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paying it forward rather than having
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Shifting the burden to the kids uh I can
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in my own family in a larger family I
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can think of those kind of incidences
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we're taking on home parents taking on
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home loans or withdrawing money God
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forbid from their 401K plans Etc to fun
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education so that's one explanation U
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the second is maybe the choice of
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schools uh and I'm just completely
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relating to this based on some of the
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focus group work we were doing for This
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research that almost every single
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incident there was a focus on education
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but the emphasis was on community
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colleges State schools rather than the
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more expensive private schools so there
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could be couple of those and then
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finally um you know uh if if you also
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another way to ask the question is what
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proportion of the population is going
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for higher education versus the broader
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population all those could be factors
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feeding into this perplexing finding I
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think thank you for that insight and I
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just wanted also to highlight as a
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sociologist I'm happy to hear that
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you're you have the survey data but
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you're also doing the focus group um to
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kind of get the uh in-depth uh data
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around what also this could be factors
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contributing to that so thank you so
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much Fredo one small point there is you
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know when we run
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surveys at some point the data set
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becomes smaller and smaller and smaller
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that it's no longer statistically valid
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to say you know for example young
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hispanic Latino females uh living in the
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rural areas I mean you're so far down
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that you're not going to have a sample
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to be able to do that so you want to add
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some color commentary to that with the
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dialogue discussions and focus groups
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let's continue this conversation David
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about student loans um unfortunately
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student loans is a significant burden
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for many young adults what impact do you
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think Philadelphia High School students
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from underrepresented groups and
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designing this app has on its
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development and can you discuss a little
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bit about how the ferse app aims to help
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high school students understand the real
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cost and risk associated with higher
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education
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financing okay so well a couple things
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to say we bring high school students
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students to campus and they learn
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entrepreneurship they learn coding they
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learn the uiux you know everything that
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goes into an app uh which is you know
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good for them it's also good for the app
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because the app is designed for students
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like them it's designed for uh high
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school students who for whom college is
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something they're considering and to um
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engage those students to to bring them
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through the app um to the point where
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they can digest the information that we
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are providing that is crucial right you
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see people can go through all this but
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if if after do all these simulations
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people look at the result and they don't
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really internalize it then uh we haven't
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achieved our goal uh so um that we we
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have these students are designing
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something for uh people like themselves
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and they socialize a lot they go back to
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their school they they have people try
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it out we go to these schools all the
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time I was just actually just at AFF
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Philly High School just this morning um
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and uh we actually and we're actually
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visiting the Community College of
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Philadelphia uh next week um and so we
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are always reaching out uh to
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fine-tuning it so that it will be uh you
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know it it will it will serve the needs
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that people actually have and I should
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add also that one thing that we see this
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app doing as is is as an as an an assist
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to our school counselors right when our
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school counselors uh which you know
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typical school counselor might have I
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think about 400 students an average I
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think I think it's about the the ratio
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of students to counsel like 400 to one
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and that's you know tough job and uh to
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make you more um to help you be able to
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answer the questions uh when someone
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walks in walks in the door and say I'm
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thinking about this school I'm thinking
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about this major I'm thinking about
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pursuing this uh line of work to be able
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to show some hard numbers the hardest
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numbers we can come up with I think uh
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should be uh I I hope a a good assist to
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these uh you know overworked uh you know
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teachers what do you find in terms of uh
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you know if I if I think about you know
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today's technology uh you can use them
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pretty intuitively and quickly uh
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without a lot of training so what what
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is your finding with the with the app
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here with teachers uh counselors and
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students being able to use it
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intuitively over time we're trying to uh
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socialize it s further and further
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Beyond uh you know uh to people who are
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more and more strangers to us to to the
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goal is that some a total stranger could
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pick it up and just plow right through
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it and get right to the end and and get
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the um uh get all the benefit from it uh
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we are making more progress to that goal
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all the time I would say that um if if
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you look at it by the way you can go to
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f.org that's the um that's the website
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you'll go there right now uh you can see
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that that um you know the students have
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built I believe a very uh nice user
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interface that um brings you through it
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in a way that doesn't demand too much
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from you uh and gives you I think
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rewards here's another reward you get
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right away which is the net cost of
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colleges uh the net cost can be very
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different from the sticker price Penn's
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a good example uh the net cost for many
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students uh is actually zero um and uh
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in General it's low um and you you see
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if you see the sticker price of 880,000
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or what I think it's more than 80,000
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now whatever it is a huge number uh you
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might just look at that and oh forget it
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you know that's just that's that's crazy
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talk right uh but right away right away
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the app shows you uh the median sticker
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price students actually pay and then you
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can go of course further and say well
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you know given your financial
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circumstances you you can learn that in
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fact maybe it's it's zero I should add
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while I'm saying that that we've
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designed it very carefully so that we're
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not storing anything you put in so
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there's no privacy issue here right so
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don't worry about that because I know
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this is private you you put in Family
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Resources that's private uh but we're
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not uh we're not storing that or
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anything like that so the point you're
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making is a direct uh kind of connection
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to the focus group I was describing
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where the parents were talking
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automatically about community colleges
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and state schools thinking about the
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sticker price for private schools
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whereas if they were educated through
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the ferse they would thinking about net
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cost not stick price yeah there's that
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though I don't of course I don't want to
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throw water on the two-year schools and
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that's one thing that that's that's sort
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of our next um our next goal is to fold
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in two-year schools to the choice Set uh
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because that certainly can be affordable
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way to you know here in Philadelphia go
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to go to CCP Community College
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Philadelphia get the two-ear degree and
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then transfer into Penn State and now
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you've spent a whole lot less money the
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point being that they have the access to
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full range of options yes yes I say at
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the moment it's only the fouryear
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schools but but but but we're expanding
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it to the two-year schools too David one
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of the things as I hear you say is this
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information could really be
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life-changing for individuals because it
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opens up options that may not have been
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at reach for individuals who maybe as
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you said college is something that is on
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the radar but what type of college and
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where that college is um that aligns
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with the goals of what they're trying to
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do May broaden that um and so I think
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that work is really really important and
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also um thinking about how can we make
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sure we include different types of
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Institutions to make sure we have as
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many individuals using this app and by
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the way I I will we will have that um
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link for the app as well on our um
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website okay Saria um let's change the
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the conversation from student loans now
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to thinking about hispanic Henry's um
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and henries is an acronym um but it
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stands for high earners but not yet rich
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uh the study of the report uh by the Tia
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Institute found that over 90% of
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Hispanic henries want to grow their
00:19:35
wealth by investing and diversifying
00:19:38
their income streams um are there any uh
00:19:42
New Opportunities available to Hispanics
00:19:44
based on that those findings and what's
00:19:47
prompting this change in mindset in
00:19:50
comparison to their parents uh
00:19:54
generation it's a great question it's a
00:19:56
fast growing population and an equally
00:19:58
fast growing GDP if you were just to do
00:20:00
a GDP assessment of this uh of this
00:20:03
demographic group and so what we learned
00:20:05
from this focus group of this High
00:20:08
earners but not yet Rich group is that
00:20:11
they really want to shift from and this
00:20:13
I think is interesting work for your
00:20:16
money quote unquote mindset uh that they
00:20:20
saw their earlier Generations parents
00:20:22
grandparents have two make money work
00:20:26
for you so we that interesting shift in
00:20:30
mindset uh with this group that we're
00:20:33
discussing to enjoy the fors of Labor
00:20:36
hard work uh enable A Better Living
00:20:38
standard take take of the future
00:20:40
Generations Etc um and family tends to
00:20:45
be kind of the top Focus 40% of the
00:20:48
group that we survey ranked as number
00:20:50
one uh more than even meaningful career
00:20:53
actualization those kinds of goals um
00:20:56
and I I think while there's an
00:20:59
opportunity for Hispanic individuals
00:21:02
themselves even within this group to
00:21:03
seek education advice uh we think and
00:21:06
this is where I get excited that there's
00:21:09
an opportunity for financial
00:21:11
professionals who are serving and
00:21:13
providing advice and financial guidance
00:21:16
to adjust their approach uh so I'm in
00:21:19
the business of talking to financial
00:21:20
advisers day in and day out and
00:21:22
providing this change in mindset is
00:21:24
pretty exciting uh to meet their
00:21:26
Hispanic clients where they are and and
00:21:29
uh multi-generational considerations and
00:21:31
this is a faar out of mind resistance to
00:21:34
jargon the financial services industry
00:21:35
is like jargon leaded so can you
00:21:37
simplified and speak in you know in a in
00:21:39
a way that people can relate to uh
00:21:42
address this lack of trust that uh uh
00:21:45
financial institutions might have uh all
00:21:48
those adjustments if a financial
00:21:49
professional can make they can meet
00:21:52
where this demographic group uh
00:21:54
important and growing demographic group
00:21:55
lives and and provide the requisite
00:21:58
guidance
00:21:59
and advice can we talk a little bit more
00:22:02
about this the role of trust um in in
00:22:04
kind of understanding the state of
00:22:06
financial Wellness for Hispanic
00:22:08
Americans particularly the report found
00:22:11
in the quote do it with me in quote
00:22:14
model of financial advice that is
00:22:16
integral to overcoming distrust of
00:22:18
financial institutions in the Hispanic
00:22:20
Community can you explain more about
00:22:22
that model and then how it can help
00:22:25
build trust and decrease Financial
00:22:27
disparities within the Hispanic
00:22:28
Community just make a couple of points
00:22:30
here um you know even though there's a
00:22:33
shift in mindset I was describing make
00:22:34
money work for me there's still you know
00:22:38
our research is showing some scars left
00:22:40
from previous generations uh from a
00:22:43
distrust uh in the room and we engag in
00:22:46
these focus groups um so uh when we
00:22:49
asked you know what kind of Investments
00:22:51
would you want to be making uh by way of
00:22:54
what their interests are mutual funds
00:22:56
you know comes uh came up to to the for
00:22:59
Real Estate I was surprised 529s came up
00:23:03
too and those tend to be like bit
00:23:05
esoteric in a general conversation but
00:23:07
they did come up as a preferred
00:23:08
investment class and uh they also
00:23:11
Express a desire to be partners in
00:23:14
making financial decision not just like
00:23:16
hand them you know here's what you
00:23:17
should do checklist but rather wanting
00:23:20
to partner and be educated on the
00:23:22
options and the considerations not just
00:23:24
be told what to do and to reiterate my
00:23:27
point earlier that I made jargon um you
00:23:30
know kind of be educated informed in
00:23:32
simple language so that all of this
00:23:34
advice is accessible to them yeah that's
00:23:37
really important I wanted to um also go
00:23:40
back to something that um David talked
00:23:42
about in terms of the role that the
00:23:45
finse app is doing and then the the
00:23:49
adaptations and expansions that you're
00:23:50
doing within the um the app particularly
00:23:53
around adding to now making sure you
00:23:55
have uh information for community
00:23:57
colleges um are there plans to um also
00:24:00
to do any other expansions within the
00:24:02
app um as it relates to young adult
00:24:04
financial planning space well uh a
00:24:07
couple things uh one is that one new
00:24:11
module developing for the app is
00:24:13
answering questions about um what does
00:24:17
it mean to major in this subject what
00:24:20
doors am I opening and what doors am I
00:24:22
opening you know less um by majoring in
00:24:25
this versus that a little anecdote my
00:24:28
father
00:24:29
uh eventually ended up in medical school
00:24:31
what did he major in he majored in
00:24:33
Classics right Greek and Latin um and um
00:24:38
if you look across I I have a friend who
00:24:40
teaches at Wesley and is a philosophy
00:24:42
professor and he said uh well my the
00:24:45
philosophy Majors here get the highest
00:24:47
scores on the lsats and they tend to
00:24:50
become lawyers uh and so um there are
00:24:54
you know when majoring in one thing
00:24:56
versus another uh doesn't necessarily
00:24:59
mean what you think it does it doesn't
00:25:01
close off uh um you know so many doors
00:25:04
as you might think uh College can be you
00:25:07
know you can explore a lot of things in
00:25:08
college and then uh pursue um pursue
00:25:12
what you're interested in within reason
00:25:15
well you want to know what are the
00:25:16
numbers right what are the facts and so
00:25:18
that's one thing we've partnered with
00:25:19
rello Labs which is letting us use their
00:25:22
data to that tracks people uh over time
00:25:27
you can see what schools they went to
00:25:28
what they majored in and then what they
00:25:31
did right after
00:25:33
college um and then what were they doing
00:25:35
10 years later and so you know for first
00:25:38
someone was just backing up from the
00:25:40
whole financial question is saying well
00:25:41
should I go to college or not and what
00:25:43
does it mean to go to college and was it
00:25:45
mean to go to this college versus that
00:25:46
college or major in this versus that
00:25:49
well you know you want to see the
00:25:50
numbers you want to see the numbers
00:25:51
presented to you in a way you can look
00:25:53
aha that's interesting uh and now I I'm
00:25:55
seeing how people's lives you know
00:25:57
evolve uh through college and after um
00:26:01
and that's going to help me uh help me
00:26:03
make this you know help help me choose
00:26:06
choose the right uh you know beginning
00:26:08
point for myself and then you know I can
00:26:10
see the the diversity of things that
00:26:12
could happen later so that's that's one
00:26:13
thing we're working on right now lots of
00:26:16
different ways you can you can go with
00:26:18
um Financial um decision making um you
00:26:22
know you could take a course you could
00:26:23
take it to mortgages for example um and
00:26:26
uh help other kind hanging fruit as you
00:26:29
these days of course mortgage rates are
00:26:30
higher than they were a few years ago
00:26:32
and a lot of people might be tempted to
00:26:35
uh accept a big prepayment penalty on
00:26:37
their mortgage to get the the rate
00:26:39
lowered and say well okay you can do
00:26:41
that I can see why you might do that but
00:26:43
that's actually a big moneymaker for the
00:26:44
lender right because they're sort of
00:26:46
taken away a lot of your ability to
00:26:48
refinance to a lower rate if rates go
00:26:50
down and you know someone who's just
00:26:52
entering just buying their first house
00:26:53
they have no idea that you know you've
00:26:56
just uh you know given up a lot of your
00:26:58
right to enjoy you know other people are
00:27:00
going to get the new lower rate when it
00:27:02
goes down you're not going to and um
00:27:04
this same kind of simulation kind of app
00:27:07
could help people wrap their minds
00:27:08
around that sort of
00:27:11
probabilistic um um uh sort of Arbitrage
00:27:16
that's a quite right word but that might
00:27:18
be the easiest way to see it uh what
00:27:21
you're giving up by doing this and how
00:27:22
people are making money off you I think
00:27:25
you're making a good point too because
00:27:26
you think you're making a financial
00:27:28
decision now um it's really important to
00:27:31
maybe think about when you make that
00:27:33
decision what the future holds and what
00:27:35
if you're making the right decision what
00:27:37
that entails and so I really appreciate
00:27:40
that you're you and your team are doing
00:27:42
that work to help um individuals who may
00:27:45
um have some of the information but not
00:27:47
all of it so it's in a nice little
00:27:48
package for them in the app and you're
00:27:50
thinking about ways in which you can
00:27:51
build on that and so I think that's a
00:27:53
really important contribution um to this
00:27:55
whole notion of understanding kind of
00:27:57
financial liter so thank you I want to
00:28:01
um welcome both of you the opportunity
00:28:03
to share some challenges um that
00:28:06
Hispanic and other racial and ethnic
00:28:09
minorities experience that contribute to
00:28:12
this economic disparities both
00:28:14
initiatives both the ferse and the
00:28:16
report from the Tia Institute emphasize
00:28:19
the importance of financial literacy
00:28:21
among younger and underrepresented
00:28:24
populations so how critical is early
00:28:27
Financial education
00:28:28
in closing the wealth Gap and what
00:28:31
strategies um have proven most effective
00:28:34
so we brought the question of trust
00:28:36
before and uh you know I'm
00:28:40
not an expert on you know other people
00:28:44
other um you know ethnic minorities but
00:28:47
I can say that in general trust is a big
00:28:50
uh driver of how people within an
00:28:53
affinity group will make make a decision
00:28:55
right the days of everyone going down to
00:28:57
the same bank uh and getting their loan
00:29:00
or whatever there that are completely
00:29:02
over uh these days why do you go to a
00:29:05
particular mortgage broker uh or other
00:29:08
financial service provider it's going to
00:29:09
be from your from your uh affinity group
00:29:12
people that you trust and that's of
00:29:14
course a great way to get the word out
00:29:16
about um um you know a good product of
00:29:19
course it's a great way to get taken
00:29:21
advantage of too right we all know
00:29:22
Bernie maid off you know took tremendous
00:29:24
advantage of his affinity group right so
00:29:27
uh you have to uh you have to be careful
00:29:29
but that I think that sort of understand
00:29:31
that's how a lot of financial decisions
00:29:33
uh will be made some financial
00:29:35
institutions have really reached out to
00:29:37
Immigrant Community One bank I'll just
00:29:39
toss this one because it keeps coming up
00:29:41
again is US Bank has been brought up to
00:29:43
us again as uh again again as a bank
00:29:45
that's really made an effort to uh reach
00:29:48
out to the Immigrant communities U and
00:29:51
uh engage and educate and um and then
00:29:56
you know that ultimately for them will
00:29:58
be the gift that keeps on giving because
00:30:00
you know good word is going to spread um
00:30:02
so yeah that I think you think about you
00:30:05
trust trust is is going to be how these
00:30:08
decisions are made and um of course you
00:30:10
got to be careful about who you trust
00:30:11
yeah I really love the point that David
00:30:13
made about trust we've talked about it
00:30:15
through this conversation so let me add
00:30:17
a couple of others U one is you know I
00:30:20
think particularly with this demographic
00:30:23
group worth uh having a of a more of a
00:30:25
holistic perspective and a holistic
00:30:27
conversation it's one thing to say okay
00:30:29
here's your money here's your money is
00:30:30
growing with all these smart Investments
00:30:33
but taking into account family
00:30:35
considerations intergenerational
00:30:37
considerations family goals I mean
00:30:39
that's come through such a through line
00:30:41
in our research that the emphasis on
00:30:43
family I think it's going to be very
00:30:45
kind of a trust building exercise uh
00:30:47
that's one point the second I've already
00:30:49
made this point before keeping the
00:30:51
language simple and everyday language to
00:30:54
connect in the conversation is going to
00:30:57
be important
00:30:58
and then
00:30:59
thirdly uh to emphasize the
00:31:02
collaborative aspect not here's what you
00:31:04
should do here's a checklist but rather
00:31:07
let's work on it together those three
00:31:09
things I think are kind of the factors
00:31:12
that could contribute to this trust
00:31:14
building with the community and ensuring
00:31:17
their financial Wellness let me just add
00:31:20
just one more thing to that which is
00:31:21
that one stylized fact about a lot of
00:31:26
immigrant communities is that you have
00:31:27
many generations Under One Roof and that
00:31:31
is uh sort of a positive and a um I know
00:31:37
can be a risk in some situations a
00:31:39
positive naturally because as as an
00:31:41
older person you have the support of
00:31:44
your of your of your kids and the whole
00:31:46
family and that that's uh that's
00:31:49
obviously a huge help uh it does make it
00:31:51
potentially hard to save for the long
00:31:53
run though with all those demands on
00:31:55
your wealth uh from different
00:31:57
Generations it can be a little hard to
00:32:00
put money away you know for yourself for
00:32:02
your own uh retirement uh when you have
00:32:07
so many other demands on it so it can be
00:32:09
can be a little hard to to get the the
00:32:12
benefits you know always talk about you
00:32:14
know the magic of compound interest well
00:32:16
that magic only comes when you leave it
00:32:17
alone uh for a long time and leaving it
00:32:20
alone can be just a bigger challenge
00:32:22
potentially in in that context thank you
00:32:26
um both for just highlighting that piece
00:32:28
about trust again but then also you know
00:32:33
and going back to something Seria said
00:32:34
earlier as well about Longevity if we
00:32:36
think about this particular population
00:32:39
they're they are living longer right and
00:32:41
then we we're waiting you know possibly
00:32:44
thinking about the ways in which they
00:32:45
saved it earlier on if they have that
00:32:48
information they have that knowledge it
00:32:50
could really be great returns all right
00:32:52
on their investment um but having that
00:32:54
knowledge is going to be really key um
00:32:56
and I think both the report as well as
00:32:59
the app will really provide that educ
00:33:02
those Educational Tools for um Hispanic
00:33:04
Americans so I have one final uh closing
00:33:07
question for both of you uh Wharton CEO
00:33:10
uh primary's um mission is to provide
00:33:14
resources to individuals and
00:33:15
organizations that historically do not
00:33:17
have access to the Wharton resources um
00:33:20
to overall uh impact the wealth Gap uh
00:33:24
what action-oriented programs or
00:33:25
initiatives can organizations and
00:33:28
individual support and or create to
00:33:31
address the country's most pressing uh
00:33:33
socio economic challenges well let me
00:33:35
just just toss in the so we have these
00:33:37
high school students coming and um for
00:33:41
us I'm me a finance Professor that's my
00:33:43
disciplin and so when I'm think about
00:33:45
entrepreneurship to do with high school
00:33:46
students it's going to be in the finance
00:33:48
realm but I think just in general
00:33:51
bringing um young people to see how do
00:33:54
you execute on an idea how do you turn
00:33:57
sort of a a pipe dream into logical
00:33:59
steps work through them build build it
00:34:01
and then uh and and have have have a
00:34:05
working product I think that is um uh
00:34:08
people learn those skills they they
00:34:10
learn how to execute that's just going
00:34:12
to be you know tremendously valuable to
00:34:14
them down the fut in the future so I
00:34:15
know that Wharton has a lot of focus on
00:34:17
entrepreneurship it's not us it's a lot
00:34:18
of a lot of different and also I
00:34:21
shouldn't not just warness you
00:34:22
engineering throughout the university uh
00:34:25
there's a lot of um interest in
00:34:28
spreading uh entrepreneurship skills to
00:34:32
uh the community and I I think that's
00:34:33
that's you know that's a gift that keeps
00:34:35
on
00:34:36
giving uh one I'd like to add one uh
00:34:41
additional influencer positive
00:34:42
influencer in this conversation so we've
00:34:44
talked about teachers we talked about
00:34:47
counselors um we talked I talked about
00:34:49
financial professionals all very
00:34:51
important but let me add a fourth
00:34:54
employers uh if you think about the role
00:34:57
employ in fact some of the research that
00:34:59
we show uh indicate that employees trust
00:35:03
their employers when they provide them
00:35:05
benefits and other things um and
00:35:07
particularly in these different
00:35:09
demographic groups the trust levels are
00:35:10
higher with employers so one can imagine
00:35:14
working through the employers to
00:35:16
communicate and provide this education
00:35:18
leveraging that trust um and uh an ex a
00:35:22
simple example is uh if there's a
00:35:25
matching grant that the employer is
00:35:28
providing the employee then trying
00:35:32
providing them guidance to maximize
00:35:34
their contribution so that they get the
00:35:35
maximum match otherwise free money is
00:35:37
left on the table is a very simple
00:35:39
example but the role of an employer to
00:35:42
provide that guidance could also be
00:35:44
emphasized so so let's add two teachers
00:35:46
to financial counselors to financial
00:35:48
professionals let's also add
00:35:51
employers so it seems and hearing both
00:35:53
of you talk it seems that this is um
00:35:56
multi-layered um at individuals from
00:35:58
different parts of um the you know the
00:36:01
journey um whether it be a teacher
00:36:04
whether or not once you finish school
00:36:05
you're now employed and so the employer
00:36:07
plays a important role I just want to
00:36:10
thank you both so much for your insights
00:36:14
and you're just shedding light on the
00:36:16
financial well-being um particular with
00:36:18
a particular focus on Hispanic Americans
00:36:21
we will add the links uh for our
00:36:23
audience and so they can download the
00:36:25
ferse app and to read the report
00:36:27
produced by the Tia Institute the
00:36:30
Wharton Coalition for equity and
00:36:31
opportunity remains committed to
00:36:33
elevating the work that our faculty and
00:36:36
partners do to enrich their the lives of
00:36:39
others as well as serving as a go-to
00:36:42
resource for evidence-based solutions to
00:36:44
the problems of inequity and access
00:36:48
thank you so much
