Download Business and Financial Literacy for Young Entrepreneurs

Business and Financial Literacy for
Young Entrepreneurs:
Evidence from Bosnia-Herzogovina
by Miriam Bruhn and Bilal Zia
Discussant Comments
Margaret Miller
Provides a strong environment for financial
literacy intervention – best case scenario
– Looks at a complete training program offered by a
qualified instructor (good case) – NGO
Entrepreneurship Development Center, faculty from
Univ. of Tuzla, used interviews to adapt curriculum to
needs of target population
– High teacher – student ratio 1 to 6 or 1 to 10
– Monetary incentive – US$3 5 for participating, free
transportation
– Business loan clients in good standing (according to
Partner’s definition)
– Businesses with profits that are higher than GDP per
capita, 5 years old, have one or more employees
Provides a strong environment for financial
literacy intervention – best case scenario
Motivated students
• Highly motivated – small group of 117 that actually
took the training , 39% of sample that had indicated
interest in training
• People who had been late on at least one payment
were more interested
• Women were less interested
Would like to have seen the paper address this
potential selection bias more directly
Differential impacts by baseline
financial literacy level
• People with below average levels of financial
literacy had greater increases in knowledge
measured on the survey
• People with above average levels of financial
literacy to report higher profits, greater sales
• People in treatment group 22% less likely to
mix personal and business accounts –
regardless of financial literacy level
Questions going forward
• What resulted in the higher profits and sales?
• Is this a cost effective approach?
• How do you reach the populations that have
less motivation, interest
– Low levels of financial literacy
– Women