Gender Pension Gap
The second edition of the report “Opportunity Cost of the Gender Pension Gap and Retirement Savings”, prepared by the ClosinGap Association and led by MAPFRE, reveals that inequality in retirement and savings between women and men has an economic impact of €28.5 billion per year, equivalent to 1.8% of GDP.
According to the study, this gap prevents the creation of nearly 500,000 jobs and reduces public revenues by around €4.9 billion annually.
The Gender Gap in Retirement Income
The figures show significant differences: women receive €510 less in monthly pension benefits than men, and only 57% of female pensioners have access to a retirement pension, compared with 82% of men. In addition, three out of ten older women depend on a widow’s pension.
“The challenge, therefore, is not to resign ourselves to inequality as an inevitable legacy. The challenge is to accelerate this process: to ensure that women’s career paths are not conditioned by forced sacrifices or invisible ceilings; to guarantee that longevity—one of our national strengths—does not become a factor of vulnerability; and, above all, to secure retirement as a stage of autonomy and dignity, not of uncertainty”
A Direct Impact on Retirement
Es necesario activar las cookies para ver este contenido
The report also highlights additional challenges related to dependency. On average, women live five years longer than men but have fewer financial resources to cover care costs, which, after the age of 80, amount to 1.8 times the average female pension.
For ClosinGap and MAPFRE, reducing the gender pension gap is not only a matter of social justice but also of economic efficiency: it would mean greater consumption, more employment, higher tax revenues, and stronger social cohesion.