AARP and ABA Join Forces to Power Financial Literacy Among Older Americans

As older adults are losing $3 billion each year to fraud, and with financial literacy among the aging population at continued low levels, AARP and the American Bankers Association’s Community Engagement Foundation will work together in developing and launching financial education initiatives designed to protect older Americans.

The announcement of this alliance was made at the 2014 Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) America meeting, where the ABA noted that its partnership with the AARP will assist in providing bankers, older Americans and their caregivers the information, resources and tools they need to limit financial fraud.

There are several components of the partnership, including the conducting of research on fraud and financial caregiving, the development of resources for bankers that enable them to understand how to prevent fraud against older Americans, and mobilizing bankers throughout U.S. communities to provide financial literacy education to older Americans and their caregivers.

The financial literacy industry will be watching this partnership closely to evaluate its success since older Americans represent a key population segment for many providers of financial education. Given its breadth of scope, this alliance between the AARP and the ABA should touch a large number of older Americans and should serve as a catalyst for other such initiatives going forward.