Financial Literacy for Athletes and its Impact on NIL

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A $3,000 bank deposit. Holy shit!

I still remember when I opted out of the dining hall plan and decided to cook for myself.

Since it was included in my athletic scholarship, they sent me a check for a little over $3k.

That was the first time in my life I didn’t spend an influx of money on pointless stuff, but decided to invest it in stocks.

I budgeted out how much I needed for food and then put the remaining amount in my Robinhood account.

For me it became:

• spend $200 on a pair of shoes and be down $200

or

• invest my money to make $200 and get the shoes for “free”

It was an easy choice.

You can get a FREE stock here on Robinhood if you’re interested. Usually it’s some bogus company, but my one buddy actually got Apple so I guess it’s worth a shot.

The Power of the Compound Effect

Start investing earlier. Become financially independent earlier.

Financial literacy is something I always stress to student-athletes (even more so now with NIL).

Only 18% of college students invest in the stock market. So, I’d imagine that number is even lower for collegiate student-athletes.

When I was at Boston University, there were only 3 kids out of 18 that invested on our team.

For further reference it went like this…

I started investing in stocks. My two roommates became interested and I got them hooked.

The System is Bullshit

The bottom line is the system is bullshit. They don’t teach you anything in school about money.

They’ll teach you about pointless stuff, but nothing about how to become financially independent.

Don’t you think it would be important to teach kids about taxes, investing, budgeting, paying bills, opening a bank account, credit cards, debt, and making smart financial decisions?

You can go on YouTube and learn more about these concepts in a few hours than from 16 years of school.

Even at Boston University I was learning about complex financial models, but had no clue what to do with my own money.

Student debt is currently at all time highs. $1,600,000,000 ($1.6 trillion) last time I checked and it’s only going to get worse as we move forward.

And now with NIL, you’re giving the opportunity to 18 year old kids to make insane amounts of money through brand deals.

How do you expect them to manage it? How do you expect them to pay taxes on it?

Zero fucking chance that will go smoothly.

In my opinion, the best solution is education on the platforms they’re already using.

Kids spend countless hours on social media – if they follow a few accounts teaching financial literacy they’ll be light years ahead of their peers.

I plan on putting out a lot more NIL and financial literacy content in the near future.

Best Financial Education Accounts to Follow on Twitter

@BrianFeroldi – tweets about money, investing, and financial independence

@FullbackFinance – former NFL fullback turned college professor, Jed Collins, helps educate athletes on financial literacy and managing your money

@SahilBloom – former college athlete himself who writes great threads on finance and breaks down the concepts in an easy to understand way

@ramit – author of “I Will Teach You to be Rich”

@BrokeMillennial – Run by Erin Lowry who is the author of the Broke Millennial series

I’m sure there are a bunch of other great follows, but in terms of strictly financial education these are some of my favorites.

Stats around financial literacy

• More than 45 million individuals owe student debt. Of those students who graduated in 2019, roughly 70% of them took on student debt with the average student nearly $30,000 in debt.

• Savings rates are decreasing. Only about half of Americans have an emergency fund, and nearly 40% don’t have money in the bank to cover a $400 emergency.
• The average U.S. household holds more than $7,000 of credit card debt and more than $27,000 of auto loan debt.
• A National Financial Capability Study by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) found that just 34% of Americans could answer four of five basic financial literacy questions

The bottom line is most American adults aren’t financially literate. So how do you expect their kids to be?

AIR x Money Vehicle Financial Literacy

A little bit of promotion here, but it ties in perfectly to this article.

The team at AIR understand how it important it is for high school athletes to get financial education so they’re not only prepared for NIL, but for life.

That is why AIR has partnered with a former NFL player, Jed Collins, and his company Money Vehicle, to provide financial literacy to student-athletes and their parents.

The content is based off of the 10 most important questions surrounding personal finances and money. I took the course and learned a bunch of new things myself.

The financial literacy course is built right into the app for ease of use. You can take it sitting on the toilet or during your long commute.

Download AIR for Free to check out the My Money Vehicle financial literacy course.