Study of 1000 Australian women found almost half don’t feel in control of money

[Helen Baker is featured as the financial planning expert in this article from the Daily Mail Australia]

Australian women need to think more closely about putting their financial well-being if they want to make sure they’ve got a buffer in place to weather life’s storms.

According to a study by MLC which surveyed 1,000 Australian women, 43 per cent of respondents said they didn’t feel in control of their financial situation.

The research also revealed a third who’d taken part said they have less than a month’s worth of savings to live off, if they needed to.

A range of factors can affect a woman’s ability to manage their finances, and not all are related to over-spending and debt behaviours, financial advisor Helen Baker told FEMAIL.

While the study did show 57 per cent of women across the country feel in control of their financial situation, the remainder cited a lack of savings as being their primary concern.

‘The gender pay gap is still a massive issue, though it’s got better in the last 10 years,’ Helen told Daily Mail Australia.

‘But the statistics still indicate that women have less superannuation, they still earn less than men and they are out of the workforce for longer because they generally tend to still be the primary carer of children.’

‘When they [women] go back to work, they are working part-time or do a less demanding job in order to take care of the family as much as possible.’

Helen’s key recommendation for women wanting to regain some control is to set up an emergency fund, or create a savings account that can absorb unexpected costs.

‘It’s about having enough set aside to take care of bills and expenses and mortgage repayments in order to manage anything unexpected that comes,’ she said.

Click here to read the complete article on the Daily Mail Australia website