Women in UK face more financial discrimination than just the gender pay gap

IWD 2019: Women in UK face more financial discrimination than just the gender pay gap

Why women in the UK face high debt, lower returns and worse pension prospects than men It’s well known that women are all too often paid less than men. The Trades Union Congress (TUC) published analysis that showed there is a 17.9 per cent difference in the amount men and women typically earn.

The analysis also shows that in a number of key industries – even in those dominated by female workers like education and social work – gender pay gaps are even bigger. In these sectors women get paid much less on average than men, both because they are more likely to be in part-time jobs and because they are in lower-paid roles. That goes some way to explaining why women typically owe 25 per cent more in debts than men, according to new research from FairMoney; and why analysis from the British Household Panel Survey shows it takes women an average of 16 years to repay student debts, compared to 11 years for men.

It’s an issue that seems to start even before they begin working and earning – with boys being far more likely to be taught how to balance the books. Gender restrictions: Seven out of 10 millennial women say they have never been taught to manage money, compared to 42 per cent of men, research commissioned by saving and investing app Moneybox has shown.

That lack of early years confidence building could also be the reason the majority of women who are married to men choose to defer responsibility for long-term financial planning and investments to their husbands.

A study carried out by UBS shows that 58 per cent of women across the world defer to their husbands for long-term financial decisions but that rises to 69 per cent of UK millennial women.

The reasons given show that there is still a significant way to go until financial equality is achieved: nearly nine in 10 of women in the UK (85 per cent) feel that their spouses know more about investing than they do, while over half (55 per cent) say their spouses discouraged them from being more involved in the family finances.

Read the full article here: https://www.independent.co.uk/money/spend-save/international-womens-day-...