EBRI: Financial Capability Linked With Workplace Financial Education Programs

Financial literacy in the U.S may have declined over most of the past decade, but workplace-based financial education programs can help counteract that, according to a joint study from the Employee Benefits Research Institute and the FINRA Investor Education Foundation.

In an issue brief published on July 7, EBRI revealed that participation in workplace-based financial education is correlated with “critical markers of financial capability,” including with individuals achieving high literacy assessment scores, spending less money than earned, being satisfied with their finances and expressing confidence in the ability to achieve a financial goal. The positive relationship persisted even when researchers controlled for gender, race, educational attainment and household income.

The Connections

EBRI’s report stated that on a five-question assessment of financial knowledge, respondents who participated in workplace-based education earned higher scores than nonparticipants. Although workers with higher income tended to score better than those with lower income, workplace-based education participants, irrespective of income, tended to score higher than nonparticipants.

Separately, in January, TIAA and the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center revealed that 3,602 U.S. adults took the TIAA Institute-GFLEC Personal Finance Index, a 28-question test on financial skills. The average respondent answered only 47% of the questions correctly, representing an overall backdrop of low financial literacy.

According to the EBRI-FINRA study, workplace-based education participants were 22 percentage points more likely than nonparticipants to rate their financial knowledge as “5” or higher on a seven-point scale, with 1 being “very low” and 7 being “very high.” The report noted that while self-assessed financial knowledge does not perfectly track actual financial knowledge, self-evaluated knowledge can influence positive financial behaviors, such as planning ways to stick to a budget and setting financial goals.

Moreover, program participants were slightly more likely than nonparticipants to report spending less than they earned (45% vs. 38%), being more satisfied with their current personal finances (55% versus 36%), and being more likely to feel confident they could achieve a financial goal (87% vs. 73%). The correlations held across respondents with different levels of household income, educational attainment and other variations.

Participation in workplace-based education did not affect the likelihood of workers with household incomes greater than $100,000 to spend more money than they earned. However, individuals with incomes less than $100,000 were 7 percentage points more likely to report spending less than they earned if they had participated in workplace-based education, the EBRI and FINRA data showed.

The report stated that although a person’s satisfaction with their financial condition may be closely linked with having higher income, participation in a workplace-based program, irrespective of income, is associated with even higher levels of satisfaction. Participants with household incomes less than $100,000 were almost as likely to report satisfaction as people who did not participate in an education program and had household incomes greater than $100,000.

People who participated in financial education at work were also more likely than people who did not to express confidence in their ability to achieve a financial goal, according to EBRI. More specifically, 94% of participants with household incomes of more than $100,000 were likely to report confidence, versus 82% of nonparticipants with the same income level. Meanwhile, participants with household incomes of less than $100,000 expressed the same level of confidence as nonparticipants earning more than $100,000.

Participation, Access Issues

Participation in workplace-based education tended to be concentrated among workers with higher household incomes, according to EBRI’s report: More than half of program users had household incomes of more than $150,000. EBRI’s report noted that this may be driven by employer offerings, however, as past research demonstrated a correlation between employee wages and the amount a company spends on its benefits.

Age, race and education levels also appeared to correlate with participation. Older workers, white workers and workers with higher levels of education were more likely to say they participated in education programs. On the test fielded by the TIAA Institute and GFLEC, men and members of older generations tended to score better than women and younger generations.

According to EBRI’s 2024 National Financial Capability Study, upon which the issue brief was in part based, 9% of workers reported having participated in workplace-based financial education at some point. EBRI’s 2025 Workplace Wellness Survey, data from which was also included in the report’s analysis, found that 15% of workers participated in a workplace-based financial wellness program—a broader category within which financial education would only be one component.

But the gap may be an issue of both access and participation, according to Craig Copeland, EBRI’s director of wealth benefits. Larger employers are more likely to offer access to workplace-based education, Copeland says, and employees who work in traditional office settings are more likely to consume educational content. However, he says, several plan sponsors have already tried to make programs more accessible for their employees who may be on their feet all day.

In addition, a survey of younger, newly hired employees, fielded earlier this year by the SPARK [Society of Professional Asset Managers and Recordkeepers] Institute and consulting service Corporate Insight Inc. found that while many respondents said they wanted help understanding their benefits, fewer than half reported receiving retirement education from their employer. Only 41% said they received enrollment materials, and fewer than 30% said they had access to financial wellness programs or adviser meetings. More than one-quarter (27%) said they received no financial education at all, highlighting opportunities for employers to offer more financial education programming.

“When employees improve their financial stability, they’re more productive at work and experience greater overall well-being,” wrote Laura Rowell, a program director at the FINRA Investor Education Foundation, in a response to emailed questions.

The SPARK survey was fielded from February through March among 960 U.S. adults ages 18 through 35 who had been in their current jobs for less than five years.

EBRI collected responses for the 2025 WWS from July through August 2025, among 1,401 U.S. adults ages 21 through 64.

Data in FINRA Investor Education Foundation’s 2024 NFCS were based on a “state-by-state survey” fielded among 25,539 U.S. adults from June through October 2024 and an “investor survey” fielded among 2,861 U.S. adults with investments outside retirement accounts from July through December 2024.