Why Women Need To Plan More Than Men for Retirement

Men and women may not be on equal footing when it comes to investing for the future. On average, women work fewer years and earn less than men, but they also tend to live longer. Therefore, women must focus on the concerns that are unique to them when planning for retirement.

Married women do not actively participate or take the leading role in managing family finances.

Problem areas: Pre-marriage money is spent on the wedding!

Many women abdicate money management responsibility to the men in their lives – father, husband, brother, son – and rarely take it upon themselves to manage the money. In most cases they are the primary home makers. So they take a lot of time off – rearing children, looking after the elderly or ill people in the house is seen as a woman’s job. This often means that women have lesser money in the provident fund, less contribution in their public provident fund, – less amounts are available for compounding.

Women on average live longer than men, so they must provide for more years in retirement than their male counterparts.

Women Live Longer
Finally, because women generally tend to live longer than men, – they will spend more time alone in retirement and may have exhausted their money on the health care of the departed partner. There are many reasons why women have to manage their money on their own – being unmarried, divorce, widowhood – are the chief among them.
Recently women have started earning more. However they do not actively invest their own money. Hopefully this could mean that women may start having a greater say. Some women think their husbands are not responsible with money – such women handle their  own money.