Hello, it’s Dr Ro, I hope you’re well. I’ve been doing some research over the last few weeks and this is a subject that really concerns me.
These are the four gender gaps.
I’m relating here to four things that have been in existence for a long time, but in reality they have really come to the fore in this last year with Covid and that is the difference in the way women are financially treated also in terms of their careers with respect to men, it’s quite a serious message and I want you just be aware of it.
To give you an idea statistically there are four things, there is the gender salary gap, the gender pension gap, gender wealth gap and gender investment gap.
This is the gap between what women make or earn or receive and what men make, earn or receive. In the backdrop of the last year, with Covid, lockdown and add to that furlough and the type of industries that may be a lot of women working versus men for example, added to which the preferential treatment men get over in certain industries the statistics suggest that globally, women are two times more likely to have lost their jobs in this last year. I think in the United Kingdom the figures was about 1.5 to 1.7 in that respect the women that were able to maintain some form of income or job during this period, i.e. Covid, Lockdown et cetera 25% of women have got reduced income.
I heard a figure of something like four to £500 per month less income in this last year now, as a result of having to take compensation, reduced income, losing their jobs, less time spent in many cases having to give up to care for their children, for example. Some pretty scary statistics from around home schooling the amount of time that people have to spend in terms of caring for their kids as a result of what’s happened in this last year of which women have taken up most of that role.
Actually these statistics came from a women’s organisation. I talk in front of so many audiences and I see a lot of conflict between husbands and wives and sometimes the man is there and doesn’t want to get up and take action. We are finding at the moment in a lot of relationships the husband is like, yeah, maybe. maybe not the wife is really driven to go do this and it might be the man pees all over the ladies dream, steals that dream or is just not motivated enough.
My message to the ladies is don’t wait, don’t wait for his mindset to come on board and get aligned with you, because frankly, it may never happen or it could take a long time and if you feel compelled to do something you feel passionate enough to be able to get up and do something for yourself and your family do it.
Don’t wait because that is the biggest challenge, people wait for everything to be perfect.
The gender salary gap looks at the amount of difference between what women are earning and what men are earning, that’s the first one the second one is the gender pension gap which is unbelievably scary, and in fact is greater than the income salary gap. So again, don’t quote me on this the gender pension gap due to the fact that women have most likely had to work for less years due to the fact they probably gave up their job at some point during their career to look after the children and take what I believe is the most important role in family go do that and then come back potentially into their careers, of course you’ve got a gap there.
By the time they get to retirement there’s significantly less money available for women in their pension pot and a figure like 47%, 50% of what men actually have again a huge gap. Now add to the fact that the divorce rate has been going up and escalated and in fact during Covid we have had an increased pressure and a spike on the divorce rate.
This August divorce rules and laws are changing to make it even easier for people to divorce, you add that into the pot where in many cases, woman in a relationship is financially not so well off because she may have taken the responsibility of being the carer of the kids, et cetera having that gap in career, husbands carried on now there is a breakup in many cases, statistically what’s showing is that men are financially better off than women.
These are all freaking scary numbers and I think it’s a sobering thought for watching this that has doubts about relationships or is in a good relationship just thinking I want to get myself sorted out financially. The gender wealth gap I see a lot with the presentations I do is to do with women in terms of building wealth for themselves and typically again statistically, women do less of this than men. Albeit oddly enough, I’ve talked to thousands of people as a property investor over the years and I can tell you that women generally make better investors than men, and in a lot of cases, men go gung-ho into staff and egos come into play, whereas a woman is a lot more coachable and intuitive.
The challenge of course is that women also tried to play it safe in many cases, if you look at some statistics regarding savings I think women have dramatically larger savings accounts than men do but a lot of that money is weighted into things like cash accounts, as opposed to possibly investments.
Have a think about the wealth gap. The difference between long-term wealth that women have on average versus the long-term wealth that men have on average and that worth could be owning property portfolio for example, where you start buying now and the assets grow in value. That will add to your wealth, you can still work but this is working in the background, and that will help balance maybe potentially a gap that exists already in your life financially.
The last one is the investment gap, meaning that yes savings wise traditionally, women may have been more conservative.
Although, oddly enough women may be earning less money they on average put more money aside than men, which is unbelievable.
With the little money they have earned they put it aside into a lot of cash accounts which have performed appallingly and will continue to do so over the coming years. That’s my personal view based on where the economy and interest rates are of course, whereas men may be more bullish in their investment strategies and bought properties in the stock market trade, et cetera.
Women as well are being as open to looking at opportunities to invest so these are four gaps to be aware of. My message to you is change the pattern.
Don’t let history or historical experiences of you and your family particularly if you’re a woman be the reality of the future.
You can redefine the future.
History does not have to repeat itself for you if you start to make changes.
Dr Ro signing out.
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