Why are we terrified to talk about money?

Over the recent months, I have been asking most of my friends a fairly uncomfortable question; Do you know what your pension is invested in?

I usually get one of two answers;

1. I have no idea, I leave that to my (INSERT HUSBAND/PARTNER/BANKER)

2. It is in cash, I do not know much about the financial markets, it scares me

While financial blindness is not gender specific, legacy biases materially tilt the odds against women.

The brutal reality, get comfortable to being uncomfortable ladies:

• Women retire with 30%-70% less than men.

• In the UK women need to work for an average of 19 years more, 19 YEARS, to gain parity to male counterparts at retirement.

• Women make 80 cents to the dollar relative to men in the workplace.

• On average, women live 5 years longer than men, ie women need to fund 5 additional years of retirement life than men do.

(Please click on any of above statistics for linked sources)

Adding to other issues including that women are less likely to ask for raises than male colleagues, feminine targeted products are more expensive than their counterparts, (and... , and... the list goes on), this all means that the average income per year of life for women is materially (c40%) below that of a mans.

Why do I bring all this up? So we can start talking about it!

Firstly, I find that after the initial shock at the question, most of my friends were extremely eager to explore the topic to GET IN CONTROL of the subject. The overwhelming response was, I would LOVE to talk about it to understand it better.

So here I am, inviting a dialog on the subject.

Many of the issues with pay disparity, etc are structural and will take time to address as a society however what we can do TODAY is to make the money you have saved work as hard for you as possible to make up the shortfall.

So pull your head out of the sand, ask those hard questions about your pensions and empower yourself to create your the best possible version of your own financial heaven. If you need a nudge, send me a message or comment here. I am happy to sit in that discomfort with you today to help enable an empowered 'financial tomorrow'.

Disclaimer: I am not a professional financial advisor or providing any investment recommendations.