Knowledge gaps, behaviour parity: gender differences in financial literacy in Europe (European Central Bank)

Summary

• The report analyzes gender gaps in financial knowledge and behaviour across 20 EU Member States using 2022 OECD/INFE survey data.p.3
• The gender gap in financial knowledge is statistically significant in 18 out of 20 EU Member States examined.p.6
• The gender gap in financial knowledge is more pronounced for investment decisions at 16%, compared with 5% for daily financial concepts.p.7
• Controlling for socio-demographic factors, women are 11% less likely to be top performers and 4% more likely to be low performers than men.p.11
• Employed individuals are 7% more likely to be top performers and 6.5% less likely to fall within the low-performing group.p.11
• In 9 out of 20 Member States, women are less likely than men to hold investment products.p.13
• Increasing financial knowledge from zero to maximum raises the probability of being financially resilient from 12% to 41%.p.13

Key insights

1. Financial knowledge is evaluated across seven core concepts, including time value of money, interest rates, inflation, and risk diversification.p.6
2. Low performers are defined as answering fewer than three questions correctly, while top performers answer all seven correctly.p.7
3. The gender gap in financial behaviour is negligible or statistically insignificant across all studied EU Member States.p.8
4. Women report more prudent financial habits, performing better than men in budgeting, making considered purchases, and paying bills on time.p.8
5. Highly educated individuals are 12% more likely to be top performers and 8% less likely to belong to the low-performing group.p.11
6. Women obtain lower returns on educational attainment than men when translating education into financial literacy.p.13
7. Moving from zero to maximum financial knowledge increases the probability of holding an investment product from 15% to 44%.p.13