The majority of retirement plan participants learned about finances from their parents.
According to a new survey by American United Life Insurance Co. a OneAmerica company, 56 percent of respondents reported learning about finances from their parents, choosing from a list that also included books, a teacher or other family members.
Younger adults between the ages of 20 and 30 were even more likely, 71 percent, to have learned from their parents.
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"Parents should take these findings to heart and understand the tremendous role they play in the financial literacy of their children," said Marsha Whitehead, vice president of marketing communications for the retirement services division. "They should understand how important it is that they, themselves, understand finances and the basics of retirement, knowing their children are learning from them."
The companies of OneAmerica recently surveyed 6,360 visitors to its participant website to determine how they learned about finances and prepared for retirement, what resources are most effective and how confident they are with their retirement preparations.
"These findings tell us that there's opportunity for our industry to fill in knowledge gaps," said Whitehead. "We need to pool our resources and help parents raise financially literate children. Better educating participants about their own retirement plans could have a ripple effect on future generations of retirement plan participants."
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