5 Money Misconceptions about Women
From the very beginning, women are suffering a strong discrimination. They cannot speak their mind, have to struggle a lot to work, cannot wear whatever they like—actually this list is endless.
Due to some forceful protests by women for their rights, they are gradually gaining position in the society. Though they’re becoming economically more independent, yet the irritating stereotypes about women aren’t completely eliminated.
Time has come when we should debunk all these wrong notions, forever. To free the world from these baseless beliefs, you need to know what they are. So, are you ready to know?
- Women Avoid Taking Risks: One of the common money misconceptions about women is that they’re not risk-lovers. Thankfully, no evidence is there to support the above statement. It will be total injustice on women to consider the half-baked studies to validate it. Julie Nelson, a renowned economist, disregarded this belief stating that when it comes to taking risk, in most of the studies, similarity has been found in women and men rather than differences in their risk-taking behaviors.
However, both the genders look at risk from different perspective. Men consider risk as a thoughtless decision, and get ready for it without much calculation.
On the other hand, women try to predict the outcome by doing so much calculation before risking anything. According to a survey done by Spectrem Group on rich women, 216 out of 400 said that they wouldn’t think twice before investing in ventures involving high risks like commodities, hedge fund, real estate, and many more.
- Are Inefficient in Financial Management: Various ads portray women as shopaholics. The common mass accepts it happily without any objection. Two major factors are the driving forces behind the arousal of such a concept. Firstly, women don’t mind spending money on fashion accessories and outfits. Secondly, they go for last minute purchase. What’s wrong here is that last minute purchasers shouldn’t be taken as impulse shoppers.
Many a time, women forget to include some necessary items in their shopping lists. Buying such important things at the last minute doesn’t make them spendthrift.
Gender has no relation with financial management. Despite this fact, it is women who are blamed for managing their money badly. This mentality should be changed. Both men and women can learn how to do money management rightly by reading online blogs on it.
- Can’t Understand Retirement Plans: Several years ago, women weren’t taking savings for retirement seriously. But, now as they’re becoming more educated, things are taking a positive turn. This seriousness is especially seen after the US’2008 recession. With the closing of the layoff orgy, women also started to take interest in exploring the various options of retirement offering by their companies.
When the recession was over, it was found that the percentage of women enquiring about plans of retirement increased from 47% to 72%. Pretty high, isn’t it? Retirement options like Roth IRA, Solo 401k, 403 (b), and 401K—all are becoming increasingly popular among women. This increased interest has further debunked the belief that women are not serious about their retirement savings.
- Don’t Have Much Investment Knowledge: Again a wrong view. Among many other money misconceptions about women, this particular belief tortures the homemakers the most. When they attempt to give any investment-related suggestions to their husbands, their husbands don’t consider their views. This, in turn, further lowers their confidence level.
As per a study conducted on financial literacy, women have as much investment knowledge as that of men. But, due to their low confidence, men stir up easily. The investing skills of women are no inferior than seasoned investors. Unlike men, women emphasize more on regular savings. This is a characteristic of an experienced investor.
In a research done by Fidelity, it has been proved that whereas men are saving only 7.9% of their salaries, women are saving 8.4%. All these data point to the fact that women can make some outstanding decisions, if they get the chance to come at the investment front.
The Bottom Line
With the progresses taking place in society, old values are losing their importance, giving place to the new ones. The personalities like Sheryl Sandberg, and Irene Rosenfield have already proved that women can also make businesses successful as that of men.
They are constantly giving their efforts in learning different financial strategies and implement them rightly using their brains. The day when we all are laughing on these misconceptions will come soon.
If we want women to come forward, we should uproot the above-cited superstitions from our mind. We all know that if women get chance to make them financially strong, they can do it with ease and even give men a tough competition.
Jennifer Cooper is a personal finance blogger, who writes about budget planning, personal finance tips, retirement planning, credit cards, 401k and personal finance management.
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Category: Family Finances, Financial Education
