Black women generally experience a loss of $1 million in lifetime earnings.Īnd children are not the only people women are caring for. Unequal caregiving labor results in an average $400,000 loss in lifetime earnings for women over the course of a 40-year career, according to research by the National Women's Law Center (NWLC). Pew Research Center recently reported that married women tend to spend more time on household chores and childcare, while husbands spend more time on leisure activities. That penalty can be attributed, at least in part, to women taking on more of the childcare responsibilities than men. “Mothers are also paid less for each child that they have, which impacts how much discretionary income they have to save,” Valle Gutierrez tells Fortune. Not only do mothers face the gender wage gap-women still earn $0.83 for every dollar men make in 2023-but they also face a “ motherhood penalty” when it comes to hiring, salaries, and perceived competence. Women generally face more threats than men do to their long-term financial security, but those challenges are compounded for women with children, the report finds. “Mothers are the ones that are paying a penalty for the status quo.” Mothers disproportionately shoulder society's care work, points out the report’s author, Laura Valle Gutierrez: “Our retirement system is based on lifelong earnings and work, but our work systems and our economy really are relying on the unpaid and undervalued work of women and mothers specifically,” she says.
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