Caregiving Crisis: The one with me screaming about retirement
The tentacles of women's pandemic workforce departures will stretch for decades and generations.
Hey everyone,
This week my kid took the bus to school for the first time and I finally cried. It was, by my count, his sixth first day of kindergarten this year. I’d been waiting for a First Day moment to hit me. But there’s little emotion when you’re trapped in a whirlwind of: pods, outbreaks, nanny, after-care, remote-yet-in-person learning, hybrid, canceled hybrid and, fingers crossed, hybrid part deux.
Taking the bus made it all seem real. Finally. We were the only family at the bus stop that morning. He clutched the pass I had to collect at 6:45 am — not wanting him to miss another chance, lest hybrid be suddenly canceled again1. He lugged his Star Wars backpack up the steps, sat down in the first seat and waved through the window. I think/hope he was smiling behind the mask.
My husband was all smiles — proud to achieve his dream of being a Bus Stop Dad. I smiled too. But as the bus pulled away I dissolved.
I cried for so many reasons: Happiness that my son is growing up. Sadness that he is growing up. Saving just a bit of time and gas money driving him to school? Maybe relief that life feels even the tiniest bit normal after so long?
Signs of normalcy are popping up, like the flowers I spy pushing through the ground on my Zoom-call walks. Stimulus checks are going out, parents are getting a ‘basic income’ for their kids from the child-tax credit, vaccine production is surging and distribution is swift. Some 400 million doses have been administered in 132 countries. In the U.S., Biden’s goal of 100 million shots in his first 100 days is set to be met six weeks early.
But under the surface, trends are still worrying. The bus is moving but the road is bumpy. In the U.S., no demographic has returned to pre-pandemic employment levels, the New York Times reports. There are about 10% fewer employed Black women than a year ago, but only 5% fewer employed white men. Racial economic disparities are deepening. Racial hatred and violence are worsening. Six Asian women were murdered this week in Atlanta by a gunman who, authorities said, was having a “bad day.” The heartbreak of these acts and images is profound. We have a lot of work left to do.
Thanks, as always, for reading. Message me with any and all feedback. Hang in there.
What To Know About the Caregiving Crisis This Week
NEWS WATCH: WEEKLY ROUNDUP — Keeping tabs on legislation, regulation and conversation:
The leaders of Biden's new Gender Policy Council outline ways to fix the "overlapping health, economic and caregiving crisis" in a Fortune op-ed. Jennifer Klein and Julissa Reynoso note "millions of working families were barely trading water before the pandemic." The American Rescue Plan, they write, addresses childcare through getting vaccines to teachers to get kids back in school and focusing on helping childcare providers through expanded support.
"This is a critical first step toward building a care infrastructure that must also include investments in paid family and medical leave, long-term care, and high-quality jobs for caregivers," write the council co-chairs. (Read CC coverage on the council here.)
The Federal Reserve is putting more women and minorities in charge. Reuters reports that the central bank is recognizing its largely white/male leadership of regional banks needs to diversify to better serve a changing U.S. This year, 34% of the 108 directors at its 12 regional banks identify as racial or ethnic minorities, up from 29% last year and 17% in 2016, a Reuters analysis shows. Women now comprise 44% of director positions vs. about 25% five years ago. Those numbers put the Fed more in-line with America, where about 40% of the population identifies as part of a racial or ethnic minority, and 51% as women.
Researchers are looking at how caregiving affects an estimated 3 million kids and teens helping to care for ill or disabled family members now that they're home. They have no respite from in-person school or activities, reports Kaiser Health News, which one researcher said can lead to anxiety, depression and isolation.
“We had a number of kids who were much more stressed out because they had no outlet. “Now they’re suddenly 24/7 care and there was absolutely no break,” said Melinda Kavanaugh, a social work profession at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who is researching Alzheimer's and caregiving in Latino and Black communities.
Bottom line: Better policies start with more voices at the top, which is why the new gender council and better diversity at the Fed are promising. The toll of caregiving on younger generations is a sad trend to watch.
RETIREMENT CRISIS COULD FOLLOW CAREGIVER CRISIS — One of the reasons I’m so obsessed with what's happening to caregivers is because I spend my days thinking about retirement. (It's part of my day job.) So I get out my 'jump to conclusions mat'2 when I see the very immediate numbers about women leaving jobs and think/worry/shake my fists at the long-term implications.
Leaving the workforce to be a caregiver means lost contributions to 401(k)s, lost career growth, lower future wages and so much more. And women were already tracking to be worse off in retirement before they left the workforce by the millions in the pandemic. Here’s why:
Women live longer than men.
Take more time off to care for family.
Are more likely to work part-time jobs.
And of course, women make less money than men, some 82 cents on the dollar. (FYI - Women's Equal Pay Day is next week. The symbolic date marks how far into the new year women must work to be paid what men were paid the previous year. For women as a whole, it's March 24. Black and brown women have many months to go.)
In the U.S., women typically enter retirement with $70,000 less than men (Bank of America Merrill Lynch). And some 20% of women have nothing saved at all (CNBC/Survey Monkey).
Older women are more likely than men to be living in poverty. There were an estimated 7.1 million older Americans living in poverty in 2018, and two out of three were women, reports Justice in Aging. Black and brown women are also far more likely to be in poverty than white women. All of these numbers are likely far higher since the pandemic.
The media, glad to say, is starting to devote more attention to sorting out how the pandemic is exacerbating these retirement trends. Recent headlines and what you should know:
CNBC - Nearly 40% of women are considering scaling back or leaving the workforce—here’s how that can affect their retirement savings. If a woman's salary is $50,000 a year - a one-year break would reduce retirement savings by $106,469, according to Fidelity. For $100,000, that's doubled to $212,936 in lost retirement income. That doesn’t include lost wages.
CNBC - Women lag behind men in saving for retirement. The Covid pandemic has made it worse. Compounding all the trends is a lack of education for women.
“I don’t know if it is a conscious thing, but we don’t encourage women to think about money in the way that we often encourage men to,” said Heather Zepeda, managing director at Northwestern Mutual in Washington. “The side effect to that is women are often left out of really important financial conversations.”
The Guardian - Young women 'must work 40 years longer than men' to plug £100k pension gap. The average woman in the UK will have to work 37 years longer than a man of the same age to reach retirement parity, due to earning less, working part time and caregiving, a new study finds. Separate but related: the UK government this month unveiled a plan to pay to pay some 200,000 women an average of £13,500 to top-up underpayments to their state pensions. A study found certain married women didn't get the automatic increases for their husband’s pensions they deserved, building up to a shortfall of about £2.7bn.
Pensions & Investments - Virus exacts toll on women’s retirement savings, workplace diversity efforts – panel. A retirement industry panel for International Women's Day called for companies to take "corrective actions" to keep women working and contributing to their funds. Efforts could include flexible work arrangements, paid fellowships and sabbaticals. Speakers cited a Center for American Progress report that estimated women's total lost wages would amount to $64.5 billion a year if the levels of maternal labor force participation and work hours experienced during the April 2020 first-wave peak of infections were to persist long term.
The media is also giving advice to women about how to fix the problems that they did not create.
CNN - Women's retirement savings have been hit hard. Here's how to recover. These articles make me angry. They lay out the case as to why women are behind and then offer advice to women on what women can do to fix these systemic problems. TheStreet also talks about 'what women can do' to counteract "the pandemic's brutal impact on women and their retirement." Let’s get it! Sigh.
The media needs to do a better job of yes, a) helping women and giving them some tools but b) recognizing this is a societal issue. If I’m in danger of falling off a crumbling bridge, should I get out my duct tape and hope for the best? Sheesh.
Bottom line: There is so much at stake for years to come. For women, their children, their entire families, down the line. We need to shore up the infrastructure as soon as possible to get caregivers supported and working. This is an everyone problem. Women can’t save their way out of it. As Jack Bauer says, there is no time.
Signing off
Thanks, as always, for reading. Please send feedback, articles, gifs, screaming mom memes. If you find value in this newsletter, please spread the word.
Caregiving Crisis is a newsletter written by Emily Fredrix Goodman. We aim to publish weekly but other things may get in the way.
Oh, Office Space.