Single women lag their married counterparts in retirement readiness, says study

Unmarried women don’t feel as ready for retirement as married women, according to a new study published by the Employee Research Benefit Institute. The new research, which compared retirement behaviors amongst more than 1,500 workers and 1,100 retirees, found that unmarried women have lower retirement confidence than married women and are more likely to have lower financial assets. According to the data, while 56% of women who had never been married and 58% of divorced women had less than $25,000 in assets, only 27% of married women could say the same.

The report found other discrepancies around retirement finances, too. Married workers felt more confident about their ability to manage their day-to-day finances than women who had never been married and were more confident than single women about their ability to handle emergency expenses. They were also more confident they would have enough assets to last through retirement.

Related: September 7 is National 401(k) Day: Time to bring retirement readiness into focus