It’s very important to place the need for a financial education today in perspective so people understand and appreciate the conditions most of them, knowingly or unknowingly, are dealing with as they try to accumulate wealth in our financial system. Hopefully, the events of last year’s market crash and the ensuing bailouts have shown the public how the consumers are repeatedly screwed by the Wall Street, political and regulatory elites, better known as the 3 ring circus.

In truth, this 3 ring circus is only interested in their corrupted ability to manipulate the system to line their own pockets and give them more power. They could care less about the public they are supposed to serve.

Nothing illustrates this point more dramatically than our present worldwide financial debacle and recession caused by the 3 ring circus and yet they are the major recipients of the TARP bailout money, not us the taxpayer. In both directions, they’ve made billions & everyone else lost big time.

Look back in history, our country’s financial debacles have always been caused by the 3 ring circus but the public’s losses in 2008 were so huge – trillions of dollars – that this time, they destroyed the trust and integrity so vital to the financial service industry. There is no doubt that a hands-on practical financial education is necessary and a better way to insure against such massive losses in the future due to one amazing fact.

When you combine the constant corruption and self dealing of the 3 ring circus with most people’s deplorable lack of a practical hands on financial knowledge and education, it makes the public highly susceptible to the continual bad advice and poor performance of the big Wall Street firms and most financial planners (who are nothing more than glorified salespeople) with their hidden agendas, conflicts of interest, self-dealing and high fees designed to line their pockets and not yours. Only now are people finally realizing this and firing their financial advisors in droves while searching for a better alternative.

Well, a practical, hands-on financial education is certainly a better alternative and a cleaner, more cost effective way for the consumer to become money and investment smart. Nothing is comparable to this type of education as it instills the confidence and knowledge to take control of one’s finances thereby preventing the consumer from being taken advantage of by the Wall Street boys and most financial planners with their hidden agendas.

Such a financial education should provide its students a reliable source to receive the necessary financial education and knowledge, from the most elementary to the most sophisticated, which allows them to control their finances, get out of debt as quickly as possible, and become money and investment smart. This financial education should further allow a student to know how to constructively use experts in every area of financial planning from the legal, tax, business, asset protection and investment arenas. This should then be done totally free of the high fees, middlemen, conflicts of interest and self dealing so prevalent in the financial service industry today. A financial education student should be so armed to be able to determine that he or she is in fact going direct for any one of these services.

Most investors have a “fellow the herd” investment mentality and have been perfectly content depending naively upon Wall Street to be responsive to their needs. Even many multi-millionaires have been guilty of the same mentality but are now actively seeking advanced financial education and investment avenues so they can be first in strategic investment opportunities. On the other hand, many less well off individuals drowning in debt are seeking the necessary financial education to help them be debt free in less than 15 years, including their mortgage. Therefore, these needs must be addressed by any well thought out financial education curriculum. Heaven knows the type of financial education curriculum this article has been addressing is long overdue.