Women, Work & Money: Five Interesting Facts – Kveller
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Women, Work & Money: Five Interesting Facts

Throughout the month of October, in conjunction with the Jewish Women’s Foundation of New York, we put a special focus on women, work and money here at Kveller. This meant talking about everything from savings plans to work-life balance (or as one of our readers pointed out, imbalance) to maternity leave and childcare. And what did we learn? Well, just as there’s no one way to be a woman, there’s certainly no one way for women to handle, think, and talk about money.

At the end of the month, we asked you (our awesome readers) to take a short survey and tell us about your work and financial lives. We were very interested to learn what you had to say, and better than just a bunch of pie charts and graphs, we were able to get a better picture of the women of Kveller and how they roll. We thought you might like to know, too, so here are five interesting facts from our survey results:

1. 50% of the women who took the survey work full time outside the home. Is that more than you expected? Less? As part of our series, we interviewed two prominent working moms; pediatrician and writer Claudia Gold and Rabbi Ilana Garber. Both had sage wisdom on the topic, including this gem from Garber: “I am fulfilled by what I do and my children are fulfilled by having a mother who is fulfilled.” However, working out of the home also comes with a price. As one reader requested, “Would love to see tips for dealing with mommy guilt for parents who work outside the home. Knowing that other people deal with this is helpful, but practical tips would be great too.” Amen. 

2. Our readers are educated. We mean, like really educated. When asked the highest level of education completed, the most common answer was Master’s Degree, and 18% also have a Doctoral Degree of Professional Degree (JD, MD). So what does this mean? If you have pursued higher education, does that mean you are more likely to pursue a full-time career? And does that necessarily mean you’ll hold onto that career once you start a family? For Alina Adams, once she became pregnant with her third child, she left her corporate job and took a major pay-cut. How have you dealt?

3. The majority of our readers feel financially stable. When asked about your family’s current financial situation, 62% replied they felt either somewhat stable or very stable. On the other hand, 37% percent replied they felt somewhat or very unstable, a percentage we can all agree is a little bigger than we may hope. And in today’s economy, it’s no surprise. How has the current economic turmoil affected your family? We shared five easy tips to save money for your family, and would always love to hear more money saving tips from our readers. 

4. Most of you have some money in savings. We were glad to hear that nearly 50% of survey takers have money going into a retirement account, and 44% have college savings accounts set up for their kids. It is slightly alarming that 23% of those surveyed said they do not have any money in savings. At all. If you want to know more about the what and how of savings accounts, CPA Bette Hochberger filled us in on 529 Savings Plans for college and financial guru Suze Orman also weighed in on the best college savings plans. Side note: we were extremely happy to get this comment from one of our survey takers: “Immediately after reading about 529s, I FINALLY opened one (and it was super easy!).” Way to go!

5. You want more articles on work-life balance. At the end of the survey, we asked readers what content related to women, work and money they’d like to see more of on Kveller. The most popular answer definitely goes to work-life balance. One reader asked for more, specifically stating, “Work-life balance, especially when you don’t have family nearby.” Another shared that she “integrated my kids into my work (usually carrying them in a carrier where they could cuddle & nurse while I went about my work .” What are your ways of dealing with work-life balance? We know that every mom will struggle finding her own balance, but hearing stories from others who have done it (and survived!) is always inspiring.

We loved hearing from you on these ever-important topics, and will definitely be taking these results into consideration as we move forward and continue to talk about women, work and money on Kveller. In the meantime, we would like to keep the conversation going right here, right now. Let us know how you deal with money. Chime in with your work stories, whether they be successes, failures, or somewhere in between. Help us, and the rest of our audience, understand the ways in which women can have it all, whatever that means to you.

The Women, Work & Money series was brought to you by a generous grant from the Jewish Women’s Foundation of New York. For more information about the important work they do, go here.



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