Majority of women are primary breadwinners

The 2013 study, conducted with more than 2,000 women ages 25-75 with a minimum household income of $30,000 a year, also found that women of influence are better informed about their financial future, including their prospects for retirement. Forty-seven percent of these women began saving while in their 20s and they are more likely to have started saving for retirement than the average respondent.

Only 1 percent of these women say they have not begun saving versus 12 percent of all women surveyed.

As a result of their “financial savvy and empowerment,” the report adds, women of influence tend to have:

• More earning power (average of $57k/year versus $48k/year for all women surveyed);
• A higher incidence of post-graduate education attained (26 percent have completed a graduate degree versus 20 percent for all women surveyed); and
• More success in the workplace (they are 50 percent more likely to be a business owner and 80 percent more likely to be at the director or VP level within their company than the average woman).

Fifty-seven percent of women surveyed say also they have more earning power than ever before. And six in ten say they are the primary breadwinner in their household. More than half (54 percent) of the women also describe themselves as CFO of their household and 75 percent say they can’t rely on their husbands to handle the investing.