Women need to be involved in joint finances

In many relationships, one partner takes the financial lead but that can become a serious problem when things go wrong. TV anchor ALISON KOSIK found this out the hard way during her divorce, when she realised just how unprepared she was to manage her own money.

Even successful and highly capable women often feel intimidated by personal finance. Some have never set up a pension or kept track of household spending. For many, financial planning has simply been left to their partner either because of time pressure or how they were raised to think about money.

In this short video, you’ll hear practical guidance on taking control. You'll learn how shared financial responsibility, clear communication, and the help of a financial planner can make a major difference for couples.

Key takeaways

Even financially successful women often feel unprepared when they don’t engage with their personal finances.

Cultural and social norms still discourage women from learning about money.

Couples should both understand and participate in their household finances and consider seeing a financial planner together.

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Transcript

Robin Powell: Alison Kosik was the face of Wall Street for CNN.

But, when her marriage hit the rocks, she realized how little she actually knew about personal finance.

Why? Mainly because she’d left it to her husband to make all the financial decisions.

AK: Yes. I was CNN’s business correspondent for 15 years. I often reported from the New York Stock Exchange, the biggest stock exchange in the world. But in my own life, I wasn't involved in managing my own finances because I let my husband handle all things financial. 

And that wound up being the biggest mistake of my life. Because when the marriage went bad, because he handled all the financial stuff, I wound up staying in the marriage years longer than I should have.

I felt stuck because I felt overwhelmed at having to suddenly handle all the financial responsibility that I had not yet been experienced, and actively doing, so I didn't have the confidence. I didn't think I had the good judgment. I didn't think I had the knowledge necessary. 

RP: Alison’s experiences prompted her to write a book called What’s Up With Women and Money?

As part of her research, she interviewed several high-achieving women like herself and was amazed at how many had come to the same realization that she had.

AK: One of them is a woman who’s working in the venture capital space. She's raising money for companies. She's growing companies. When I interviewed her, I heard words like, I'm terrified about money. Money overwhelms me. I don't know where to start. I'm not good at it at all. And here's the thing. She was 53 at the time when I interviewed her. 

She didn't have one retirement account set up. She had never budgeted and didn't know the basics about personal finance. 

RP: Why, then, do so many women rely on their husbands to handle money?

For Alison, there are two main reasons.

AK: I mean, it could be as simple as, you know, we lead busy lives where, you know, we're running companies, we're building our careers. 

And when we get home, the last thing we want to do is dig into some good old fashioned financial literacy and figure it out. We're exhausted after a long day. We've got kids to take care of.

I think a deeper issue that probably is at the crux of all this is that there's a cultural aspect to the relationship that women have with money, and it starts young. It starts when we're girls. 

And whether parents want to admit it or not, maybe they're doing it, and they don't realize they're doing it. But girls and boys are, our socialized differently around money. 

RP: It is a bad idea for women to have no involvement at all in the household’s finances. If you don’t, you need to do something about it.

AK: I think if you're not involved and let's say you have a husband who is completely involved, I think go to him and start to have a conversation and say, you know what, I want to start to understand and what you're investing in. 

Show me. Show me the passwords to all the investment accounts. Show me how much debt we're carrying. 

What's your life insurance policy say? Let me see that. 

Ideally, Alison says, couples should also engage with a financial planner, someone they both trust, who can take an objective view of their finances.