Childhood matters: Family education and financial inclusion

Education plays a key role for future success and has attracted massive attention. However, the emphasis has been mostly focused on school education, and family education has been largely undervalued. Using a sample of 22,242 individuals from 27 emerging countries, this paper examines how family education impacts individuals' financial decisions, and ultimately financial inclusion. We find that improvements in the quality of family education are positively related with individuals' likelihood of opening bank accounts. More importantly, such relationships are especially pronounced among the most commonly excluded groups of individuals: those living in poverty, in rural communities, and without a job.