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This paper explores how the anticipated expenditure on children's college education affects household asset allocation, applying a two-stage budgeting model of asset demand by using the 2016 China Family Panel Studies Data (CFPS). The empirical results show that if a household plans to send a child to college, the probability of holding risky assets increases by 1.7 percentage points, and the probability of holding investable housing assets increases by 3.8 percentage points. Furthermore, we also find that as the expected year of college entry approaches, households prefer less liquid assets. When the expected year is still far in the future, they prefer liquid assets with high-risk and illiquid assets with high-return. These findings imply that policymakers should make reforms in the financial market and real estate market, as well as provide more kinds of investment products, thereby promoting household investment diversification.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate roles of financial literacy, financial behavior, and financial capability as mediating factors between financial education and financial satisfaction. Design/methodology/approach Data are from the 2012 National Financial Capability Study, a large national data set with detailed information on financial satisfaction, education, literacy, behavior, capability, and related variables. Mediation analyses are used to answer research questions. Findings Financial education may affect financial satisfaction, a subjective measure of financial well-being, through financial literacy, financial behavior, and financial capability variables. Results show that subjective financial literacy, desirable financial behavior and a financial capability index (a sum of Z-scores of objective financial literacy, subjective financial literacy, desirable financial behavior, and perceived financial capability) are strong mediators between financial education and financial satisfaction. Research limitations/implications The study has used cross sectional data that can only document associations between financial education and satisfaction and the mediators between them. Future research could use relevant longitudinal data to verify multiple benefits of financial education. Practical implications The findings have implications for financial service professionals to take advantages of multiple benefits of financial education in content acquisition, confidence in knowledge and ability, and action taking when they communicate with their clients. Social implications Policy makers on consumer financial education may use the information to advocate and promote effective education programs to improve consumer financial well-being. Originality/value This study is the first of this kind to examine the association between financial education and financial satisfaction and several financial capability variables as mediating factors.

While recent work on financialisation of everyday life has elucidated the reshaping of everyday consumers as risk-taking investors, the role of financial advisors (FAs) has been overlooked, even though they are key intermediaries in articulating households and individuals into circuits of global finance. Through a financial ecologies approach, this paper focuses on FAs to reveal the ambiguities and inconsistencies inherent in their professional practice as varied modes of corporate management and organisational practices lead to differentiated encounters that shape the financial knowledge and investment decisions of clients. Empirical analysis is based on industry reports, regulatory documents, personal interviews and ethnographic fieldwork at professional training and networking events. The findings demonstrate how professional intermediaries like FAs are vital in explaining the shifting and uneven configuration of investor subjects. A critical analysis of FAs reveals how the decision making process and investment practices of consumers are fraught with knowledge asymmetries and embedded in distinctive financial ecologies with variegated outcomes. The ecologies concept is mobilised to explain the resilience or fragility of relational formations, the entanglement of diverse elements and motivations in the variegated formation of investor subjects, and the operation of constitutive ecologies within the financial system.

Background/purpose. This study investigates the costs and returns of education in Thailand, comparing the International and Bilingual Education Programs. It examines the financial implications of these educational choices, aiming to determine the economic viability of each program. The findings offer insights to guide parents and policymakers in making informed choices. Materials/methods. Data were collected from 1,230 participants, including 794 from the International Education Program and 436 from the Bilingual Education Program, using a structured questionnaire. The analysis employed cost-benefit principles, focusing on metrics such as net present value (NPV), benefit-cost ratio (B/C ratio), internal rate of return (IRR), and payback period. Results. The International Education Program incurs higher costs (4,883,078 THB per student) than the Bilingual Education Program (1,634,480 THB per student). Despite the higher costs, graduates from the International Education Program achieve a higher cumulative income of 76,961,952.97 THB, with an NPV of 10,326,880.71 THB, a B/C ratio of 3.11, an IRR of 16.39%, and a payback period of 8 years. In comparison, the Bilingual Education Program offers a cumulative income of 48,101,220.61 THB, with an NPV of 7,871,744 THB, a B/C ratio of 5.82, an IRR of 25.30%, and a shorter payback period of 5 years. Conclusion. Both programs are economically viable investments. The International Education Program yields higher lifetime income, while the Bilingual Education Program offers greater cost efficiency and faster returns. These findings underline the significance of aligning educational investments with long-term economic goals and individual affordability.

There is growing interest, worldwide, in the link between education systems and the production of skills that are valued in the labor market. With growth stagnating and unemployment soaring in much of the world, educators are being asked to focus more on producing skills that feed into labor productivity and support the sustainable growth of employment and incomes. This timely volume contributes important new findings on the dynamics of education systems and labor market outcomes in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). It analyzes an important recent shift in labor market trends in LAC: the first decade of the 21st century has witnessed a marked decline in the earnings premia for university and secondary education. This, in turn, is contributing to reduced income inequality across the region. The recent trend contrasts with the sharp rise in tertiary earnings premia that was observed in the 1990s and that helped to reinforce high levels of income inequality in the region at that time. The authors recommend that, having achieved very large increases in secondary and tertiary enrollment, the region should now focus on improving the quality of its education systems and the pertinence of education curricula for the needs of the labor market. At age 15, the learning achievement of the average Latin American student still lags two years behind his or her Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) contemporary. The study opens up an important agenda for future research. While the evidence presented on the trends in education earnings premia is clear, the conclusions about the causes and significance of those trends are largely based on suggestive evidence for a limited number of countries, and are not definitive because of data limitations. The findings call for further in-depth analysis of the nature of skill mismatches, to inform policies that can strengthen the region's future economic growth by enhancing the productivity and earnings potential of the workforce.

This study estimates the prevalence of consumer fraud in China and investigates consumer fraud risk factors using a novel two-stage conceptual framework that differentiates fraud exposure from fraud victimization after exposure. Multivariate analyses show that multiple risk factors have opposite effects on the two stages, with older age, lower income, higher debt, lower education, and rural residency associated with a lower risk of fraud exposure but a higher risk of fraud victimization after exposure. Three variables are identified as risk factors in both processes: being a migrant, having a higher level of objective financial knowledge, and having at least one chronic condition. Our conceptual model and empirical results demonstrate the importance of utilizing a two-stage approach in consumer fraud victimization research that may help clarify the many mixed findings in the literature.

This paper analyzes the trading records of a major discount brokerage house to investigate the disposition effect, the tendency to sell stocks that have appreciated in price (winners) sooner than stocks that trade below the purchase price (losers). In contrast to previous research that has demonstrated the disposition effect by aggregating across investors, our main objective is to identify differences in the disposition bias across individuals and explain this in terms of underlying investor characteristics. Building on the findings in experimental economics and social psychology, we hypothesize that differences in investor literacy about financial markets and trading frequency are responsible in part for the variation in individual disposition effect. Using demographic and socioeconomic variables as proxies for investor literacy, we find empirical evidence that wealthier individuals and individuals employed in professional occupations exhibit a lower disposition effect. Consistent with experimental economics, trading frequency also tends to reduce the disposition effect. We provide guidelines for investment advisors, regulators, and investment communities to utilize our findings and help investors make better decisions.

Sustainable development is a complex dynamic process covering economic, social, and ecological dimensions. Theoretically, education investment can enhance educational capacity and offer high-quality education services, thus improving human resource quality, promoting social justice, and strengthening ecological awareness, which significantly and positively impacts sustainable development across these three dimensions. An empirical study using four-variable vector autoregressive models, with data from 2003 to 2020 on education investment and sustainable development in China and the United States as a contrast, reveals the following: (a) The impact of educational investment on sustainable development is dynamic, with the direction and strength of the effect varying over time and depending on different countries’ development conditions. In the U.S., previous-year educational investment can boost its own growth, social equality, and ecological development but may reduce per capita schooling years and human capital growth due to diminishing marginal effects. (b) In China, the previous year’s educational investment promotes current social equality but slightly hampers talent capital accumulation, ecological development, and its own growth. The investment from the year before last still promotes social equality, increases per capita schooling years for talent capital accumulation, has a less negative impact on ecological development, and inhibits its own growth more weakly than the previous year, showing declining effect strength. (c) Policy-wise, countries should diversify education investment sources, target areas with high positive marginal effects on sustainable development, and establish a dynamic adjustment mechanism for education investment to better promote sustainable development.

In recent years, the aging of the population and the tightening of the labor market have made the relaxation of the two-child policy a pivotal measure to promote population growth. As an essential part of socio-economic development, urban families’ changes in the cost of their children’s education investment under the two-child policy are significant in understanding the policy effect and optimizing the demographic structure. This paper analyzes the impact of the two-child welfare policy on urban families’ education investment costs using the HOV model to provide data support and decision-making reference for policy formulation. The research methods include analyzing the distribution of educational resources, predicting the impact of the two-child policy on the cost of educational investment using the HOV model. The cost of educational investment for urban families increased significantly after the two-child policy was implemented. The average price of educational investment increased by 15%, and the impact was more noticeable for low-income families. The two-child policy is beneficial for population growth but also increases urban families’ educational burden. It is recommended that the Government optimize the relevant welfare policies to reduce the burden on families, and at the same time improve the allocation efficiency of educational resources to ensure the sustainability and fairness of the policy.

This study investigates the factors influencing investment decision-making within South Africa's financial markets, focusing on psychological, demographic, and external market elements. Drawing from Prospect Theory, the research reveals a deviation from traditional behavioral assumptions, highlighting that external market dynamics, rather than individual risk perceptions or demographic traits, predominantly guide investor behavior. Using a quantitative cross-sectional design, data were collected through structured questionnaires from 120 randomly selected South African investors aged 18 and older with market experience. Structural equation modelling assessed factors influencing risk perception and subsequently, investment behavior. The findings demonstrate that market-related variables significantly influence risk perception (? = 0.653, p < 0.001) and decision-making, aligning with the Efficient Market Hypothesis. In contrast to Prospect Theory's expectations, risk perception had no significant direct effect on investment choices (? = -0.009, p = 0.933). Cognitive biases and emotional influences exerted a moderate impact, while demographic characteristics, including gender, education, and experience, showed minimal influence on investment decisions, suggesting that practical market experience outweighs formal training. With robust construct validation (CR = 0.711 to 0.951), the study enhances the reliability and credibility of the findings. It highlights global regulatory frameworks as crucial for investor confidence. These results contribute to behavioral finance literature and support practical implications for policy, market transparency, and investor education. Future research should consider diverse populations and qualitative investors' perspectives.