Financial literacy is an issue that should command our attention

The statesman Ron Lewis once warned with sober voice: “Financial literacy is an issue that should command our attention because many Americans are not adequately organizing finances for their education, healthcare, and retirement.” These words, though plain, hold the weight of prophecy. For a nation may have strong armies and tall cities, but if its people are not wise in the use of their wealth, the foundation crumbles silently from within.

What is financial literacy, if not the wisdom to steward one’s resources with foresight? It is the art of planning, the discipline of saving, the prudence of distinguishing want from need. Yet how many live from wage to wage, blind to the storms that await them? Without this knowledge, families stumble into debt, the sick suffer without care, the aged endure their twilight in want, and the young mortgage their futures before they have even begun. Thus Lewis speaks truth: this issue must command our attention, for it strikes at the very heart of survival.

History itself testifies to this lesson. In ancient Rome, the republic was weakened not only by wars but by the crushing debts of its citizens. Many were sold into slavery because they lacked the means to pay creditors, and unrest spread like fire among the people. Only when reformers addressed the burden of finance did peace briefly return. The fate of Rome reveals this: when a people cannot manage their economic lives, the state itself teeters. To ignore financial literacy is to invite disorder into the home and the nation alike.

Consider too the modern story of the Great Depression. Banks fell, markets collapsed, and countless families lost everything. Yet those who had practiced thrift, who saved when times were good, who knew the value of restraint and planning, endured the storm more firmly than others. Their literacy in finance did not shield them completely from suffering, but it gave them tools to rebuild when hope seemed lost. Here again the wisdom of foresight proved itself greater than the illusion of endless prosperity.

Lewis points to three pillars where financial wisdom is most urgent: education, healthcare, and retirement. These are not luxuries but the bedrock of life itself—the shaping of the young, the healing of the sick, and the care of the old. To neglect saving and planning for these is to gamble with one’s future and the future of one’s family. A society where people cannot educate children, cannot heal the body, and cannot protect the aged is a society that has betrayed its own dignity.

The lesson for you, O seeker of wisdom, is clear: cultivate financial literacy as you would cultivate virtue. Learn how money works, how to save, how to invest, how to prepare for the long journey of life. Do not live only for today, but plan for tomorrow. Seek not only to earn, but to manage well what you earn. For wealth is not measured only by income, but by the strength of discipline and foresight.

Practical action lies before you: set aside a portion of all you gain, no matter how small. Learn the principles of budgeting, that your spending may reflect your values. Guard yourself against the chains of unnecessary debt. Teach your children not only letters and numbers, but also the art of managing resources, that they may be free in both body and spirit. For when families are strong in financial literacy, the nation itself is strengthened.

Thus let Ron Lewis’s words endure as a guiding fire: “Financial literacy should command our attention.” To neglect it is folly, but to embrace it is freedom. With it, the young may rise, the sick may heal, the aged may rest, and the people may prosper. And in that prosperity, not born of chance but of wisdom, lies the promise of a future both secure and bright.