How high schools are tackling a capitalist education

Pop quiz!

What market structure best describes NASA in the 1990s?

A. Government Monopoly

B. Commercial Monopoly

C. Oligopoly

D. Monopolistic Competition

Take a second…

If you guessed A, congratulations! You might just pass a high school course in financial literacy. (Wanna test your skills more? Take a special edition of our Marketplace News Quiz.)

An increasing number of states in the U.S. not only require high schools to teach financial literacy but are also now required to incorporate the fundamentals of free-market capitalism into their lesson plans.

For more on this, “Marketplace Morning Report” host David Brancaccio spoke with Ayelet Sheffey, senior education reporter at Business Insider. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.

David Brancaccio: In the last couple years, since 2022, a dozen states have passed legislation requiring some kind of financial literacy in schools. What's driving this at the state level, do you think?

Ayelet Sheffey: I think it ultimately boils down to the need for students to be able to graduate high school with a basic understanding of economic principles, especially the understanding that capitalism is the dominant economic system in the U.S. And students need to have that basic knowledge to graduate high school, be successful in the real world. Whether that's entering the workforce directly, going to college, they need to have that basic understanding of econ.

Brancaccio: I assume you see some variance across states with how this question of, “What is capitalism? How does it work?” How that gets answered. I mean, you know, you can imagine a classroom where the gist is that, you know, capitalism and the market system solves most things, and that, of course, is a notion that's in great dispute.

Sheffey: Students are just more aware of economic conditions in the U.S. They're aware that there is a wealth gap. They see headlines all the time that, you know, the rich keep getting richer. They're continuing to accumulate wealth. And that has a lot of, not just young people, but Americans of all ages, increasingly skeptical that capitalism is the system that best works for Americans and for the United States. So, teachers are forced to, you know, kind of reckon with this balance of teaching about capitalism, what it is, how it works, while also understanding that it might not work in the best way for some people.

Brancaccio: Yeah, I, having been married to a teacher for a long time, know that it takes a long time to change curriculum, but there may have to be some updating of the curriculum, right? With President Trump's impulse to intervene directly in the running of companies — you know, who should be CEO, which logo a company should use — I mean, that cuts against free market orthodoxy.

Sheffey: Some of the teachers who I've spoken to, they start each day by just looking at the headlines and having their students share, you know, how they think what the Trump administration is doing or what's happening outside of the classroom is affecting them, their family, their peers. And curriculum, you know, can be difficult to update. But it's something that teachers are having to constantly think about to make sure that they're giving a well-rounded lesson that you know, these are the basic economic principles, but what's coming from the Trump administration, what's happening politically outside the classroom, is definitely influencing those conversations.