It’s no surprise that women and men weigh financial concerns differently. A recent survey from Penn Mutual, reported in an article in LifeHealthPro.com, quantified some distinctions.

The article is an interesting read, but let me point out one item that jumped out at me:

“The women surveyed cited retirement (42%), expenses (41%) and healthcare costs (30%) as their top financial concerns, whereas, men listed expenses (38%) and the economy (35%) and retirement (30%) as their biggest worries.”

That shows that women are much more concerned than men about retirement as a financial goal. I imagine that one of the key reasons is that women have a longer life expectancy than men, so they can and should expect to need income for a longer period of time in retirement. What’s more, women often have “stop-outs” from the workforce for child-bearing and child-rearing years, a time when they likely are not accumulating assets for retirement and other financial goals.

— Sharon Emek, Ph.D.
Founder and CEO
WAHVE