Viel Potenzial, kaum Verankerung: Anspruch und Wirklichkeit von Wirtschaftsunterricht

Economic education conveys far more than just financial knowledge: it enables pupils to understand and make informed judgements about long-term societal challenges such as inflation, public debt, climate change and retirement provision. Through concepts such as compound interest, incentives and conflicting objectives, pupils learn to apply economic principles to individual and political decisions. Action-oriented approaches foster key skills for the future. Despite this potential, economic education is inconsistently integrated into the German education system and is often taught by teachers from other subject areas. Greater integration into the curriculum would therefore not only be a matter of education policy, but also a form of preventive social policy aimed at promoting equality of opportunity, economic literacy and social resilience.