If you’re a member of The People’s Pension, our secure site is an easy way for you to view and manage your pension pot with us.
If you have another product with B&CE, the provider of The People’s Pension – and you’d like more information, please visit B&CE’s financial services webpages.
Securely operate and manage all aspects of your account with us.
Secure logins to the toolkit in your Adviser Centre and to your client accounts.
Eloise Henderson
Head of Strategic Communications
T: 01293 205335
M: 07741 384460
E: media@bandce.co.uk
Blaise Tapp
Media Relations Manager
T: 01293 205336
M: 07388 943700
E: blaisetapp@bandce.co.uk
The People’s Pension1, a leading not-for-profit pension provider, has warned that childcare costs are widening the gender pensions gap, as new research finds that almost four in 10 women (38%) working part-time would choose to increase their hours if childcare was cheaper2.
The gender pensions gap is currently more than double the size of the total gender pay gap with the average female pensioner £7000 a year poorer than her male equivalent.3
In a new report, ‘The Gender Pensions Gap; Tackling the Motherhood Penalty’, The People’s Pension highlights that while changes to auto-enrolment pensions are needed to ensure lower earners or part-time workers – the majority women – aren’t penalised by the current policy, an inescapable root cause of the gender pensions gap is the ‘Motherhood Penalty’ women pay when their children are born.
The People’s Pension’s survey of 2,000 mothers across the UK, carried out by You Gov, found that after having children, nearly half of women (44%) reduced their hours, more than a third (36%) left work altogether and more than one in five (15%) returned to work in a lower grade or lower paid role.4
These changes in their working lives have a significant impact on their ability to save for a pension at the same level as men; women are likely are likely to stop or significantly reduce their pension contributions, meaning they may miss out on employer contributions and lose the investment gains their contributions would earn.
While many women choose to reduce their hours or stop working because they want to spend more time with their children, the survey found that:
Sam, 32, from Northamptonshire has three children under the age of eight and gave up work when her eldest was born.
“I gave up my job working in a supermarket as the cost of childcare would have been far more than my wages. I haven’t worked since my son was born – with my husband the sole earner – as we were better off with me at home. I’m at a point now, with two of my kids in school, where I want to go back to work but finding something that makes sense financially, with hours that work for us, is really difficult.”
Childcare in the UK is more expensive than anywhere else in Europe7. Analysis by The People’s Pension suggests that a woman in London with a child under two, who earns the median full-time income, will pay three-fifths of their after-tax earnings (60 per cent) on childcare, commuting and associated expenses, reducing take home pay to £9,700 per year or a little over £800 per calendar month. Outside of London the numbers aren’t much better with a woman on the median full-time salary paying 44 per cent of after-tax income in childcare costs, leaving her with around £13,000 a year to live on.8
Commenting, Gregg McClymont, director of policy at The People’s Pension and former shadow pensions minister, said:
“The gender pensions gap is stark. By the time the average woman reaches retirement, the size of her pension pot will only be a fifth of that of a man her age. Women are getting short-changed on pensions for several reasons – not least because of the caring responsibilities they tend to take on across their lifetime.
“To look after their children, women often reduce their working hours or stop working altogether and their rates of pay and potential for progression can be unfairly affected, all of which mean their potential pension savings take a hit.
“Of course, many women choose to reduce their working hours or leave their job because they want to spend more time with their kids, but our research is clear – the cost and availability of childcare is a key factor for many women. If we’re going to tackle pensions inequality, not only are changes to auto-enrolment required but better provision of affordable childcare is a must to enable those mums that want to keep working or work more hours, to be able to.”
To help reduce the gender pensions gap, The People’s Pension is urging the government to consider measures to improve childcare provision across the UK and ensure women aren’t penalised by current pension policy.
These measures include:
For Keziah, 37, from Leicestershire, if it wasn’t for family support, she wouldn’t have been able to continue working after the birth of her daughter as childcare cost more than she earned.
“As a single mum and the sole earner in our house I had to keep working full-time in order to pay our bills. Thankfully childcare wasn’t a cost I had to juggle as my mum looked after my daughter while I was at work. I’d already had to move to a different job and take a pay cut to allow me to balance parenting and work, and without mum I would have had to give up my job altogether as nursery fees cost more than I earned at the time.”
ENDS
Notes to editor: