ECON 12Introduction to Personal Finance
Economics · 4 units · Undergraduate lower division (0-99)
Introduction to personal finance. No previous financial, economic, or mathematics background required. Open to nonmajors. Covers wide array of topics at introductory level that are of interest to students on practical level and more broadly for students seeking to deepen their understanding of key features of financial system, financial institutions, and various aspects of personal finance encountered by typical household over their life cycle. Topics covered include interest rates, time value of money, types of loans most relevant to typical household, credit and debit cards, savings and investment, stocks and bonds, risk and diversification, personal income taxes, varieties of insurance, retirement and savings plans, macroeconomic concepts, social security, Medicare, and aspects of behavioral economics.
Letter grading.
When it runs
- Spring 2026
- Spring 2027
Scheduled, not typical — from UCLA’s Schedule of Classes, which publishes Fall 2025 through Spring 2027 and nothing before it.
Requisites
UCLA lists no requisites for this course.
Requires
Everything that has to come before this course, not just the courses named in the requisite above.
Nothing — this is an entry point.
Unlocks
What this course is a requisite for, and what those courses lead to in turn.
No course in the catalog lists this as a requisite.