Two separate studies released within a few days of each other paint a gloomy picture about the outlook of Australian women on the future.
Late last week, Suncorp Group’s Million Dollar Woman organisation released the results of its Financial Confidence Report that revealed what it referred to as “… an alarming gender gap in financial confidence.”
The report, which measures the confidence levels of working Australians, found only 30% of working Australian women are confident that Australia will avoid an economic downturn, compared with 47% of working Australian men.
“The depressed levels of Australian women’s financial confidence could go some way to explaining the reasons for Australian households diminished levels of spending, coupled with the recent natural disasters and general ‘two-speed’ economic uncertainty,” said Million Dollar Woman Chief Executive Lynette Argent.
Australian women have more debt than Australian men
The report also found negative sentiment could be explained by the fact that Australian women have more debt than Australian men. For every $1 a woman earns they owe $2.60, compared to only $2.10 for men.
Reflecting similar economic pessimism in women, Allianz has released its latest Future Optimism Index results, which found that nearly twice as many women (18%) are pessimistic about the future of the economy compared to men (10%).
The study also revealed that opposite numbers applied when addressing the proportion of women who are optimistic about the economy. It showed 20% of women are optimistic about the future of the Australian economy, compared to 31% of men.
While women were also found to be more pessimistic than men about the environment and society, when it came to the overall Happiness Index, the results were much closer, with women scoring 73% on this Index compared with 75% for men.
