I was interested to read an article on women and retirement planning, kindly supplied by Norwich Union.
Many women are in a less than envious position when it comes to being self-sufficient later in life in a financial sense. According to Norwich more than half the women in New Zealand aged over 60 currently have to live on $10,344 per year.
It’s estimated that only 13% of women will have saved more than $160,000 (excluding their house) by the time they’re 65. The other 87% will have to rely on the Government.
At the same time women need to fund a longer retirement than men. They have a current life expectancy of 79 years in comparison to men who live on average only 73 years.
More than 50% of women over 60 are left on their own to provide for themselves. It is interesting to wonder how many of those women (or even just women in general) have taken responsibility for their own financial independence.
Or have they placed reliance on the spouse or partner in their lives to cover the risks along the way with the appropriate insurance’s and to ensure that the right steps are taken to create a realistic and flexible retirement fund.
That reliance can be misplaced in more than one way. Today one in three marriages end indivorce with one third of those happening after 15 years. Unfortunately the divorce rate for second marriages is even higher.
Women without their own retirement fund can face enormous financial problems because of divorce. Statistics show that their household income may drop by 74% while the husband’s rise by 42%.
Often women have left a career or paid work to look after children and thereby sacrifice their ability to earn a greater income later on.
And women are tending to have children later. In 1996 the average age of a women having her first child was 28. So by the time children have left home her ability to create a realistic retirement fund if she needs to do it on her own has been severely curtailed.
More than 50% of women agree that they should have a retirement plan.
Reality: Only 20% get around to it.
The bottom line is that being financially independent and having choice in your retirement is too important to be left to chance.
If you don't know the state of your savings and your rights within that then you need to do something about finding out.
