We spent a week talking to hundreds of high school seniors about money, and they gave us more hope than we expected. Underneath the stereotypes about “kids these days,” we found a generation that already understands more than adults give them credit for, while still being dangerously underprepared for some of the biggest financial decisions of their lives.

So this week, we’re talking about what stood out after speaking to 400+ students across 5 high schools in the Chicago area and what parents, teachers, and honestly all of us should take from it.

They knew saving mattered, they had opinions about frugality, and some were already working jobs. There were a few who were already gambling, and way too many were about to sign student loan paperwork without fully understanding what they were agreeing to.

If you’ve got a teenager, a future college student, or a young person in your life who thinks money talk is boring, this episode might help you reach them a little differently. This conversation isn’t just about teens. It’s about what happens when financial education is too late, too shallow, or too disconnected from real life.

In this episode, we get into:

Why so many teenagers understand everyday saving but still don’t understand student loans
The shocking number of students already seeing gambling as a real way to make money
How “frugal” stopped being an insult and started sounding practical
Why kids were more engaged than the grownups who usually sit through money talks
What they got wrong about the biggest expenses in adult life and why that matters
The difference between knowing stocks exist and actually understanding investing
Why buy now, pay later needs to be explained as credit, not convenience
What this experience taught us about Gen Z, money, and the adults responsible for filling in the gaps
How parents can use AI to make money lessons click for kids who seem uninterested

Links:

Other experts mentioned in this episode: Chris Corinthian, Berna Anat, Yanely Espinal, Dr. Paris Woods

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