Financial Literacy and Household Saving and Borrowing Behavior: An International Comparison of Japan, China, India, and the United States

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The level of financial literacy is not high in Japan.Although a majority of respondents were able to correctly answer a simple question about interest rates, more than half were not able to correctly answer a question about risk diversification. Many respondents stated they did not know the answer to the financial literacy questions, which might indicate that Japanese are very cautious and only answer when confident in their response.In addition, I found that women, the young, and those with lower incomes and lower educational attainment have the lowest levels of financial literacy. Moreover, I found that financial literacy increases the probability of having a retirement savings plan, increases the probability of holding equities, and leads to higher wealth accumulation.