Here and Now: How Women Can Take Control of Their Retirement (Survey Report)
Despite the progress women have made in recent decades in terms of higher levels of educational attainment and career opportunities, they continue to face financial risks that place them at a distinct disadvantage compared to men with regard to their future retirement security.
Today, the gender pay gap persists, with women who work full-time earning 80.5 percent of what men earn.1 Women are more likely to work part-time than men and, therefore, are less likely to have access to employer health and welfare benefits including retirement benefits. Women often take time out of the workforce for parenting or caregiving and, when doing so, they forego income and benefits altogether. Statistically speaking, women tend to live longer than men, thereby implying even greater retirement savings needs. In combination, these factors have a compounding effect that severely impedes a woman’s ability to successfully achieve a secure retirement.
Here and Now: How Women Can Take Control of Their Retirement examines how women in the workforce are preparing for retirement, including how they are saving, planning, and investing – and what they are doing to maintain their health. This year, 2018, marks the 13th consecutive year that Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies® has published research showing that women are at a greater risk of not achieving a financially secure retirement than men.
1 The Institute for Women’s Policy Research, The Gender Wage Gap: 2016; Earnings Differences by Gender, Race, and Ethnicity, 2017