4 Key Challenges That Impact Women’s Finances

by Jenn

 “This is a sponsored post for SheSpeaks/Prudential.”

Hey, ladies, I suggest you take a moment and read this because it can be a game changer.  Did you know on average, women have 30% lower retirement balances than men?1  Did that get your attention?  If not, what about the fact that 44% of women have no life insurance?2  Even among women that do own life insurance, most are underinsured.

Shawn and Jennifer Worden

Have you given much thought to how you want to spend retirement?  I don’t know about you, but my husband and I want to travel and not worry about coming home at any time, just go and do.  We are road-tripping fools, we love to just go with nowhere to be.   Of course ,we must always be home at a certain time because we have children.  So, we dream of one day, after everyone is grown, just enjoying what we love to do!

jenn and shawn worden in florida

We have been lucky to do all the things we have done, but our adventures always leave us wanting to go further into untraveled lands!  However, with children, we can’t be gone too long, so we will just have to wait!  But while we are waiting, we had better kick it into overdrive, so we can have enough money to retire when we want.

Prudential has done some interesting research on the financial challenges women face over several years.

4 key challenges that impact women's finances

4 Key Challenges That Impact Women’s Finances

Below are 4 of the key challenges that impact women’s finances:

Investment Gap

Sadly, women do not seem to invest to the same degree as their male counterparts which comes at a high cost.  Women are more apt to wait on investing, invest more but at a lower risk, lower return investments and they are more likely to run out of money in retirement.  CRAZY RIGHT?

Time Gap

In the United States, women spend about 28 hours a week tending to household chores which is 65% more than the average man.4  I’m sure many of you can relate to the uncompensated work that doesn’t figure into our financial planning.  Prudential has a cool tool that is called the “Value of all you do” to help quickly quantify the value of all the household chores you do daily and what you would need to pay someone to do those chores for you.

Living Longer and Living Alone

Not only are women living longer, they are living alone.  Did you know that women outlive men by an average of about 5 to 6 years?3  Yes, and it’s important that they are financially prepared for these years.

Wage and Income Gap

Did you know that the average full-time working woman earns 79% of the income earned by their male counterpart?5 Are you wondering why?  This is due toseveral factors – taking time out of the workforce, differences in pay, women’s likelihood of negotiating salaries.  This gap doesn’t just impact women’s 401K balances over their life, it also affects their social security income.  YES, we often fail to think about social security payments.  Did you know that a woman’s social security benefits are 27% lower than their male counterparts?6

shawn and jennifer worden

I started saving for my retirement when I began working at a bank years ago. I’m honestly lucky because I learned first hand the importance of saving for retirement. But, there have been life events that have made me rethink my plan – children, moving, and everything else that comes with life.  I withdrew my 401K several years back and have since started saving again, but I’m not where I should be.  After learning about the challenges women face from Prudential, I believe it’s time to rethink my plan again, especially if I want to travel with my husband when we retire.

So, ladies do you know what this means?  It’s time to take control of our finances!  You can start by contacting a Prudential Financial advisor to get help with your journey or visit them online at ownmyfuture.pru

4 key challenges that impact women's finances

Sources:

  1. Source:  Prudential Retirement analysis reflecting defined contribution plan balances of Prudential record-kept plans as of December 31, 2015
  2. Source: LIMRA study, Life Insurance Ownership in Focus, U.S. Person-Level Trends: 2016
  3. Source: Prudential Retirement analysis; National Center for Health Statistics, Health, United States, 2015: With Special Feature on Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. Hyattsville, MD. 2016
  4. Source: Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, October 2016, http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54757
  5. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Historical Income Tables Table P-40: Women’s Earnings as a Percentage of Men’s Earnings by Race and Hispanic Origin, 2016
  6. Source: Social Security Administration, Fast Facts and Figures About Social Security, 2016

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4 comments

punkin0001 July 22, 2017 - 8:57 pm

I am sure that living alone can affect all of us.

Reply
Linda Manns Linneman July 5, 2017 - 7:55 am

Thank you so much for this great information. Our life flies by and we never know how long we will be on this earth. We do need to plan for the time that we can no longer work. God Bless

Reply
Tami Lewis July 1, 2017 - 3:21 pm

Great info and things to think about

Reply
Calvin F. June 13, 2017 - 3:12 pm

Interresting and helpful facts.

Reply

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