Financial inclusion for the elderly in Thailand and the role of information communication technology

Abstract

One of the financially vulnerable groups is older people, who receive little attention in the financial inclusion literature. The elderly is financially excluded in Thailand, an emerging economy with high financial inclusion and rapid aging of the population. Using the Findex survey data 2017, we construct financial inclusion (FI) scores with five measures and explore the influence of aging, mobile phones, and mobile money, controlling for individual characteristics. Among non-account holders, more than half are older than 55 years old. A significantly negative association between FI and age/age group is confirmed. We also prove the positive effect of mobile phones and mobile money on FI scores, by 0.48–0.49 percentage points. This study sheds light on the drivers of mobile banking among the elderly with Thai ICT data, showing that low internet access and mobile phone use are the biggest barriers to financial inclusion. No gender disparity in FI is found.

Keywords

• G21
• G23
• G53
• J14
• J11
• L86