I know that leaders of the civil rights community spoke today on this subject, and I just want to applaud them and to encourage them to stay at it. Finally, as has already been said, we have to increase the financial literacy of the American people. It's not enough to know how to balance a check book anymore. Even those fortunate to have the help of accountants sometimes have a hard time understanding all the ins and outs of investing in an IRA, paying off credit card debt, or refinancing a mortgage. I think Hillary said, it adds a year of income to people if they have this kind of training in high school.
School is, of course, the best place to start learning about personal finance.
The Department of Education will help all our schools find effective lesson plans and other tools to integrate financial literacy into their basic curriculum. These principles are the same ones we used to harness the power and benefits of the industrial revolution. They are just as vital today, if not more so, than they were a century ago. It's time now to use them to seize the enormous potential of the information revolution for every American citizen. If we work together we can help all our families have the benefits of new choices and new technologies.