YOU’RE JUST A GIRL

I am sure all women at some point in time remember a boy saying to them “you’re just a girl!”  Whether it was the time everyone in the neighborhood was picking teams for tag football or even a little later in life when it was time to close that big business deal.  Not one time in any of those circumstances did we as little girls or women backed down from the challenge, in fact it made us even more determined to be the best!  Women have always been determined to even the playing field with men in every aspect of life making equality a top priority.  Unfortunately there is one area that is being neglected and that is finances.

This has been an ongoing problem for decades where women were not taking care of business when it came to their financial lives.  The problem looked solved in 2009 when women married and single started taking a more hands on approach to their personal finances as a result of the 2008 economic catastrophe.  Women were investing more, looking for ways to save money, and spending wisely from 2009-2011.  Obviously amnesia started to set in and the feeling of fear from 2008 had eroded because in 2012 women are beginning to return to their old ways and letting other people control their financial future.  This is dangerous in so many ways because times have changed drastically here in the U.S. and around the world. 

First and foremost women are outliving men at an average of five years!  I am sure if you look at your own life you can see the number is even larger than that.  Personally my grandmother outlived my grandfather by twenty years and my own father has been dead for fourteen years.  I promise you my mother who is coming up on sixty three if she is anything like her mother by the time it is all over she would have been without my father for thirty four plus years!  That is a long time to fend for yourself financially so you can see how it is imperative that women take control of their retirement savings, long term care insurance, etc.  Women who are married should know where all important papers are from insurance to bank account statements so that if they need them they can find it with no problem.  Something else that has changed is that women are getting married in their thirties and not their teens and twenties like their grandmothers did so they have to take control of their money. It is no way that a woman can go from eighteen to thirty years old without saving any money for the future and if they do they are setting themselves up for financial failure.  It is time for all women to stand up and take control of their financial futures!  You are NOT “Just a Girl!”