Seemingly, there is nothing quite like a divorce to alter the perceptions of many women regarding money management during marriage.
A recent Bloomberg article visiting that topic and related matters employs the work “stark” to describe the difference in attitudes toward financial decision making between married and divorced women.
The Bloomberg piece spotlights survey findings culled from the answers of many hundreds of respondents. A central takeaway is this: Whereas a clear majority of women in ongoing marriages are not active in financial planning and seemingly content to leave investment decisions to their husbands, most divorced women regret not being more attuned to such matters during their married years.
What changed?
Pointedly, lots of things, beginning with “negative surprises” that many polled women say they discovered during the divorce process. Among other things, survey answers pointed to husbands’ “hidden spending, hidden debt and hidden accounts.”
Increasingly more baby-boomer aged divorced women are voicing concerns about personal finances and saving money because that demographic is divorcing at a historically high rate. For various reasons, many of those women conceded control and autonomy over money matters during long marriages to their spouses and now rue the fact.
Their desire to learn more as they embrace post-divorce life is notably positive, stresses Bloomberg, for at least two material reasons. First, repeat marriages for boomers have an even higher failure rate than do first-marriage divorces. And, second, women have longer life spans than men, which logically puts a focus on money matters in advancing years.