- The Economic Guru competition tests Finnish general upper secondary school students’ economics skills.
- The competition’s main draw is the chance to win a direct student place in one of several Finnish universities and skip the usual admissions process in which admission is based either on prior academic record or entrance examination.
- The winner of the 2024 Economic Guru competition is Patrick Itäniemi from the Tampere University Teacher Training School.
- The second place went to Tuomas Paananen from Kemi Lyceum and the third place was a tie between Ellen Byman from Ålands lyceum, Ahti Ristola from Helsingin Suomalainen Yhteiskoulu and Lauri Manner-Raappana from Otaniemen lukio.
The Economic Guru is a Finnish economics competition for general upper secondary school students. The competition has two parts: a preliminary competition that all general upper secondary schools can organise for their students and a final for the 14 finalists selected by the competition jury. The preliminary competition is a written test held simultaneously in early January at all participating schools similarly to the matriculation exams. This year, the competition was hosted at 126 general upper secondary schools, drawing about 1,300 students in total.
This year, the authentic doctoral hat that is passed on from one Economic Guru winner to the next will take a pride of place at the Tampere University Teacher Training School.
“I’ve been pursuing this since the eighth grade, so I’m feeling elated! I found out about two minutes ago that I have scored a student place at Aalto University, so I can now say for certain that I’ll be starting my studies there in the autumn”, reveals Patrick Itäniemi, the Economic Guru of 2024.
At the Economic Guru final, participants take part in both a written exam and a debate. In the written exam, finalists were asked to analyse how Finland’s labour productivity has developed in recent decades, discuss the causes and effects of these developments and present ways of accelerating productivity growth.
The debates were held in pairs and streamed live on the website of Kauppalehti, Finland’s largest business newspaper. In the debate, each participant had to argue either for or against a given motion. The participants were assigned their position at random, meaning that they may have needed to argue in favour of a motion that they personally disagreed with. This year’s winner had to defend a motion stating that the export-driven wage formation model is a good thing.
The finalists were given 30 minutes to prepare for defending their motion but were barred from using any aids, such as a mobile phone or laptop. This meant that they could not look up information on the topic.
Awards presenter Sara Mella from Nordea: Modern financial literacy skills must involve scam spotting
The Economic Guru awards were presented by Sara Mella, Executive Chair of Finance Finland’s Board of Directors and Head of Personal Banking in the Nordic region at Nordea. Mella commended the finalists on their economics skills but also pointed out that the ability to spot frauds and scams is an increasingly vital part of modern financial literacy, as scam attempts are hard to escape these days.
“Banks, telecommunications operators and authorities are able to prevent the large majority of attempted scams before the scammers ever reach consumers, but they can’t ward off all of them. Fraud and scam prevention requires the joint effort of us all. Consumers are the last line of defence – we must all be able to identify a wide range of constantly changing scams and keep a calm and steady hand when managing our personal finances in digital services.”
The recently crowned Economic Guru is also familiar with scams. “I get a constant flood of phishing messages from scammers posing as banks or other companies. I’ve never fallen for one, but I know a few people who have.”
Student places in eight universities
Economic Guru finalists have the chance to win a direct student place in one of eight Finnish universities – Aalto University, Hanken School of Economics, Tampere University, the University of Eastern Finland, the University of Helsinki, the University of Jyväskylä, the University of Turku and the University of Vaasa – and skip the usual admissions process in which admission is based either on prior academic record or entrance examination. The universities can offer student places to all or some of the finalists depending on their success in the competition.
Economic Guru is organised by Finance Finland (FFI), the Association for Teachers of History and Social Studies (HYOL) and the Finnish Financial Ombudsman Bureau (FINE). The competition is sponsored by the Kauppalehti business newspaper, Economy and Youth TAT, the Union of Finnish Upper Secondary School Students and the Taloustoimittajat association for economic journalists.
Debate motions in the final
- Everyone should be allowed to choose how their pension contributions are invested / Everyone should not be allowed to choose how their pension contributions are invested
- The export-driven wage formation model is a good thing / The export-driven wage formation model is not a good thing
- The Government must support the acquisition of electric cars / The Government must not support the acquisition of electric cars
- Artificial intelligence will put specialists out of work / Artificial intelligence will not put specialists out of work
- Raising VAT is a good way to balance public finances / Raising VAT is not a good way to balance public finances
- Tax data must remain public / Tax data should not be public
- Food delivery couriers should be in an employment relationship with the delivery company / Food delivery couriers should not be in an employment relationship with the delivery company
Written test in the final
Finland’s labour productivity development in recent decades:
- How has labour productivity developed?
- What reasons have caused it to slow down?
- What effects will the slowdown have in the long term?
- How could productivity growth be accelerated?
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