What is poverty? (Financial Planning and Stories from Inspiring Women)

There are two meanings of poverty. Normally, poverty relates to poor financial condition and the inability of a person to lead a stable life. On the other hand, poverty can reside in the mind and even when a person is not that financially stable, he believes himself to be rich. Both of these can be applied to how a person is living. Poverty is existing in almost every country and only a few nations work in such a way that its people living a normal and balanced life without having to work hard just to cover the monthly budget. The surprising fact is that most of the poor around the world are women.

Why?

Gender equality is one of the main reasons while lack of financial knowledge serves as a contributor. It is one of the most perspective and oldest forms of inequality existing in the world. It denies females and their voices, make positions of women unequal to those of men and decreases the wage of a woman.

In the previous sections, I have explained that financial knowledge and awareness in women is not that potent. Although gender inequality exists in the world and due to it women have to suffer from poverty, not having sufficient information financial management doesn’t exactly help to gain a firm standing in society. It is true that there are somethings which are uncontrollable but having and not having information about something is a completely different thing. If women want, they can certainly gain a stronger financial standing in society. Then again, lack of awareness is another factor due to which women don’t gain information and education about finance.

Following are the reasons for poverty in women:
Low Wages

Over the world, women seem to experience wage difference the most. Women earn approximately twenty-four percent less than men. This rate is enough to tell magnitudes about the difference which exists in industries in terms of wage for men and women. For the same position and same work, men are paid more than women. From a very long time now, this difference has existed and even though it has decreased with time, it is still prevailing and due to it, women are unable to save properly.

For instance, if you are being paid less for your work then wouldn’t it be difficult for you to manage your expenses since you have less amount to pay for them? Similarly, if you are earning less for your work then you have no choice either to be close-fisted or work extra to make up for it.

In most of the nations, women are not even paid half of what the really deserve and it is due to the prevalent gender gap and difference. In the same countries, men are paid sufficiently but women are not and it boosts poverty in women. When women don’t have much to save, it is likely that they will grow poor when they are old and unable to do work.

Lack of decent employment of Financial Planning and Stories from Inspiring Women

Generally, seventy-five percent of the women in several developing nations are working in the informal economy where the possibility of getting social protection, legal rights, or employment contracts is very less. In addition to it, they are often not paid enough which they can utilize to escape poverty. Six hundred million women are in most precarious and insecure forms of work.

If you don’t even get an opportunity that you can take to earn more or move to a better position, how can you ever improve your living standard? Improving the way how you are living is a gradual process and it requires you to have a stable and strong source of income. You will be able to overcome poverty only if you get a job which offers you $18 an hour while the previous job offered you only $10 an hour. This way, you will be earning more and you will have enough money to not only spend but also save without limiting your spending.

Thus, the lack of decent work is an important reason why most women live in poverty and are unable to overcome it.

Unpaid care work of Financial Planning and Stories from Inspiring Women

Women seem to do at least twice as much unpaid care work as men. This work involves both housework and childcare. Sometimes, this percentage rises up to ten percent and the international value of this work is determined to be 10 trillion dollars each and every year. The surprising thing is that this amount equals one-eighth of the entire GDP of the world.

Around the world, the primary work options that women have include childcare and housework and often, they don’t get opportunities more than these. Although it is not that degrading for women to do such type of work, the unfortunate thing is that they don’t even get paid for it. It is hard to imagine working for the whole month and not even getting paid for it.

If you don’t receive your income for the month, how are you going to manage?

It is hard to find the right answer. Unpaid care work is yet another reason that contributes to the poverty of women.