BCom alum’s paper on the financial literacy of immigrants an FCAC finalist

McGill Desautels graduate Avneet Bhabra (BCom’23)’s research paper “23% and Counting, but Not ‘One Size Fits All’: Helping Canada’s Immigrants Strengthen Their Financial Knowledge” has been published by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC) on Canada.ca. Focusing on financial literacy amongst immigrants in Canada, the paper was selected as a finalist in the undergraduate category of the FCAC’s 2023 Building Better Financial Futures Challenge. Avneet’s research proposes interventions at thegovernmental and organizational aimed at reducing structural barriers that prevent immigrants from fully participating in the Canadian financial system.

Her findings show that, while immigrants made up almost a quarter of the Canadian population in 2021, many still face financial challenges, mainly due to language barriers and lower levels of financial knowledge at different life stages. The proposed interventions are therefore designed to help younger immigrants access more reliable sources of financial information in order to reduce the likelihood of financial insecurity.

Under the supervision of McGill University Professor Laurette Dubé and University of Edinburgh Business School Lecturer Antonia Gieschen, Avneet pursued this project in her role as Research Intern at the McGill Centre for the Convergence of Health and Economics (MCCHE) during her undergraduate studies. She also credits her experience as a Fellow of the Integrated Management Student Fellowship (IMSF), offered by the Marcel Desautels Institute for Integrated Management (MDIIM), for cultivating her interest in research.