IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bbq/wpaper/0003.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Gender Investment Gap over the Life-Cycle

Author

Listed:
  • Annika Bacher

Abstract

Single women hold less risky financial portfolios than single men. This paper analyzes the determinants of the “gender investment gap” based on a structural life-cycle framework. The model is able to rationalize the investment gap without introducing gender heterogeneity in preferences (e.g. in risk aversion). Rather, lower income levels and larger household sizes of single women are the main determinants for explaining the gap. Importantly, expectations about future realizations of both variables (that cannot easily be controlled for in regressions) drive most of the investment differences for young households whereas heterogeneity in observable characteristics explains the gap later in life.

Suggested Citation

  • Annika Bacher, 2023. "The Gender Investment Gap over the Life-Cycle," Working Papers 03/2023, Centre for Household Finance and Macroeconomic Research (HOFIMAR), BI Norwegian Business School.
    • Handle: RePEc:bbq:wpaper:0003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hdl.handle.net/11250/3124932
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde & Jürgen Schupp & Gert G. Wagner, 2011. "Individual Risk Attitudes: Measurement, Determinants, And Behavioral Consequences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 522-550, June.
    2. Andreas Fagereng & Charles Gottlieb & Luigi Guiso, 2017. "Asset Market Participation and Portfolio Choice over the Life-Cycle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(2), pages 705-750, April.
    3. Fatih Guvenen, 2009. "An Empirical Investigation of Labor Income Processes," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(1), pages 58-79, January.
    4. Charlotte Christiansen & Juanna Schröter Joensen & Jesper Rangvid, 2015. "Understanding The Effects Of Marriage And Divorce On Financial Investments: The Role Of Background Risk Sharing," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(1), pages 431-447, January.
    5. Jianakoplos, Nancy Ammon & Bernasek, Alexandra, 1998. "Are Women More Risk Averse?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(4), pages 620-630, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Salem, Razan, 2019. "Examining the investment behavior of Arab women in the stock market," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 151-160.
    2. Bertocchi, Graziella & Brunetti, Marianna & Torricelli, Costanza, 2014. "Who holds the purse strings within the household? The determinants of intra-family decision making," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 65-86.
    3. Bertocchi, Graziella & Brunetti, Marianna & Torricelli, Costanza, 2011. "Marriage and other risky assets: A portfolio approach," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 2902-2915, November.
    4. James Banks & Elena Bassoli & Irene Mammi, 2019. "Changing Risk Preferences at Older Ages," Working Papers 2019:01, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    5. Cupák, Andrej & Fessler, Pirmin & Schneebaum, Alyssa, 2021. "Gender differences in risky asset behavior: The importance of self-confidence and financial literacy," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 42(C).
    6. Fey, Jan-Christian & Lerbs, Oliver & Schmidt, Carolin & Weber, Martin, 2020. "Risk attitude and capital market participation: Is there a gender investment gap in Germany?," ZEW Discussion Papers 20-080, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    7. Alserda, Gosse A.G. & Dellaert, Benedict G.C. & Swinkels, Laurens & van der Lecq, Fieke S.G., 2019. "Individual pension risk preference elicitation and collective asset allocation with heterogeneity," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 206-225.
    8. Fabio C. Bagliano & Raffaele Corvino & Carolina Fugazza & Giovanna Nicodano, 2018. "Hedging Labor Income Risk over the Life-Cycle," Working papers 058, Department of Economics and Statistics (Dipartimento di Scienze Economico-Sociali e Matematico-Statistiche), University of Torino.
    9. Marc‐André Luik & Amelia Guha Thakurta & Dennis Wesselbaum, 2021. "Child health, human capital, and adult financial behavior," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(11), pages 2722-2750, November.
    10. Nataliya Barasinska & Dorothea Sch fer, 2013. "Financial risk taking, gender and social identity - Evidence from national surveys of household finance," LWS Working papers 15, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    11. Caliendo, Marco & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. & Obst, Cosima & Uhlendorff, Arne, 2023. "Risk preferences and training investments," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 205(C), pages 668-686.
    12. Hermann, Daniel & Musshoff, Oliver & Agethen, Katrin, 2014. "I will never switch sides: an experimental approach to determine drivers for investment decisions of conventional and organic hog farmers," 2014 International Congress, August 26-29, 2014, Ljubljana, Slovenia 183084, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    13. Klemens Keldenich & Marcus Klemm, 2011. "Double or Nothing!? Small Groups Making Decisions Under Risk in “Quiz Taxi”," Ruhr Economic Papers 0278, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    14. Parrotta, Pierpaolo & Smith, Nina, 2013. "Female-Led Firms: Performance and Risk Attitudes," IZA Discussion Papers 7613, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Johnston, David W. & Kassenboehmer, Sonja C. & Shields, Michael A., 2016. "Financial decision-making in the household: Exploring the importance of survey respondent, health, cognitive ability and personality," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 132(PA), pages 42-61.
    16. Mostafa Saidur Rahim Khan & Naheed Rabbani & Yoshihiko Kadoya, 2021. "Can Financial Literacy Explain Lack of Investment in Risky Assets in Japan?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(22), pages 1-12, November.
    17. Antoine Bommier & Daniel Harenberg & François Le Grand & Cormac O'Dea, 2020. "Recursive Preferences, the Value of Life, and Household Finance," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2231, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    18. Czibor, Eszter & Claussen, Jörg & van Praag, Mirjam, 2019. "Women in a men’s world: Risk taking in an online card game community," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 62-89.
    19. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.
    20. Brooks, Chris & Sangiorgi, Ivan & Hillenbrand, Carola & Money, Kevin, 2018. "Why are older investors less willing to take financial risks?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 52-72.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Household Finance; Life-Cycle; Gender; Portfolio Choice;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bbq:wpaper:0003. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kaja Skinstad (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/hofbino.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.