In Britain, women are wealthier than men

[rawstory]

As seen on Raw Story, http://www.rawstory.com

The new face of wealth wears lipstick

By Susan Palmquist | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

Britain has long been known as a friendly place for high-achieving women. It's had a female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, and Queen Elizabeth II has ruled for 52 years. Now there's a new milestone: For the first time women make up a larger part of the wealthy population than their male counterparts.

The country has 299,300 women with £200,000 (about $363,800) or more in liquid assets - cash, shares, and bonds - compared with 271,700 men.

That means that women make up about 52 percent of the wealthy population in Britain, versus 47 percent for men. And their numbers have been steadily increasing since the late 1990s: The number of affluent women rose from 231,000 in 1997 to 272,000 in 2002.

Observers say there are several reasons behind the trend - women moving into careers with higher salaries, starting their own businesses, and investing wisely, and more equitable division of inheritances. They also hint that in the United States, women may also overtake men in terms of wealth.

Full story: http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0614/p12s02-wmgn.html

[THUNDER HANDS]

1. good

I hated that old concept of the man as the breadwinner anyway. :D

[devilgrrl]

2. Well yeah! They're smarter...duh!

:silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly:
:silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly:
:silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly:
:silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly:
:silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly::silly:

[daleo]

3. It would be interesting to see an age analysis of this

Differential life span might explain a bit of this - i.e. family fortunes tend to end up in women's hands for at least a while, because women are usually younger at marriage and also tend to live longer.

[Frodo]

4. I wonder how they score that?

All of our accounts are joint. Who gets credit for what?

[vote independent]

5. well

The reason women make less on average in the United States is because they tend to go for jobs that normally make much less money than men.

Women are a higher percentage of social studies majors in college, which tend to lead to lower salaries.

Apparently, it is not the same case in Britain.

[Frodo]

6. Not my experience.

Women tend to be more likely than men here to have a college degree - the KEY to jobs with higher salaries.

The reason women average less over a lifetime is largely the time they spend away from the workplace making all of us possible.

My question here is who get "credit" in this survey for the money my wife and I have saved? It's in joint accounts. This type of survey might not "count" us at all until one of us passes away and the other gets all the money. Since she's likely to outlive me by several years, I would image she will tilt the average.