There is a wide gender divide in retirement income confidence

Retirees have higher confidence in their pensions but gender gap remains

On the whole, British people are positive when it comes to their pension income prospects.

This is according to the AJ Bell Retirement Income Index.

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AJ Bell recorded a score of 54 in the first ever AJ Bell Retirement Income Index, where anything above 50 suggests people have confidence that their pensions offer sufficient income to support them through retirement. A score below 50 suggests a lack of confidence.

There is, however, a ‘yawning’ divide between men and women.

Men recorded a Retirement Income score of 59, while women scored 49, indicating they are confident and not confident respectively when it comes to their pensions providing retirement income.

Pension income confidence levels are higher among those who have retired – although there remains a big gap between the sexes.

The Retirement Income score of all retired respondents was 68, while female retirees scored 63.

All respondentsMenWomenRetireesRetired menRetired women
Retirement Income Index score (Above 50 = confident; below 50 = not confident)545949687463

Tom Selby, senior analyst at AJ Bell, comments: 

“With the UK economy recovering from last year’s lows, lockdown measures slowly being eased and many investors enjoying stellar returns over the past 12 months, you might expect Brits to be confident about their pension prospects.”

“Furthermore, there is a significant divide between men and women, with men recording a Retirement Income score of 59 and women a score of 49. This suggests that while men are confident about their retirement incomes, women are not”

“This likely in part reflects that women, on average, tend to build up much smaller retirement pots than men. In fact, among those who have entered drawdown since 2015 the average pensions of men are around a third (34%) bigger than women**,” Selby said.

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