Students’ Financial Habits

A non-anonymous survey was conducted among Pottsgrove High School students to get an idea of how students are spending and saving their money. 99 students took this survey, and of those 99 students, 20.2% were freshmen, 29.3% were sophomores, 20.2% were juniors, and 30.3% were seniors. Surprisingly, the results between the grade levels of this survey were fairly different from what was expected. The amount of money spent on gas per week was expected to be much higher, as well as the amount of money students spend on themselves per week. 

Majority of the students taking the survey responded that they save their money using a personal savings account, which is expected as a large number of high school students have a job, meaning they have their own bank account. 11.1% of students answered that they don’t save their money at all, which is actually a pretty large amount of people. 81% of those students that said they do not save their money were freshman and sophomores, who most likely cannot work due to their age, therefore they do not have their own money, making that 11.1% more justified. 

One question that the students were asked was what they spend the most money on. The majority of students (37.4%) answered that they spend the most money on personal entertainment. Personal entertainment includes things such as hanging out with friends, seeing a movie, going out to eat, etc. This statistic seems to be very expected, as the things you do the most, besides working, while in high school are hanging out with people. Even being in school just gives people more of a reason to go out places with friends, since students will attend school events such as football games, basketball games etc. and will go out after the games with people to get food, go to the movies, go shopping, etc. 

Some of the most unexpected results of the survey were from the questions of how much money is spent on gas per week, and how much money people spend on themselves per week. About 60% of students who responded to this question reported having spent $0-$25 per week on gas. This number was expected to be much higher, considering that almost 50% of the students in the school (juniors and seniors) can drive, and since gas prices are getting higher and higher every day. There was also an expectancy of the amount of money students spend on themselves per week to be much higher. About 43% of students responded that they spend $0-$25 on themselves per week. Knowing that most young people in general are not good with spending and saving their money, it was very interesting to see that ¾ of students in the school spend no more than $50 on themselves each week. 

Students have proven with this survey that their financial habits are actually in a good place. The results of the survey have proven that any stereotypes or beliefs that young people are bad with spending and saving money are wrong. It was expected to see in the results that students wouldn’t be saving their money, and that they would be blowing a much larger amount of their money on themselves, but the results say otherwise. We as a community need to put more trust into younger people, mainly students, as they actually do know what they’re doing, and are more educated than we think on financials.