Work/life Balance And The Debit Card - Why It Really Matters

Work/Life Balance and the Debit Card - Why It Really Matters

Many people live their lives going nowhere and doing nothing, not because they like where they are but simply because they are afraid of change. Overcoming this fear takes real motivation. It has to hurt so much that finally you can’t take it anymore and you say, “Enough is enough! I want my life to be different!”^aDavid Bach

IF YOU ARE disinterested (as I once was) in the topic of money and think it doesn’t apply to you or affect your sense of balance, consider these stats:

In 2008, Hewitt Associates consultants surveyed nearly 2 million participants in large-company 401(k) plans the company manages and found that women had an average of $56,320 in their accounts, compared with over $100,000 for men.^b

The average age of widowhood, according to BusinessWeek, is fifty-six. The typical widow exhausts her husband’s life insurance within 2½ months.^c

Only 5 percent (one in twenty) of us will have annual incomes of $25,000 or more a year at age sixty-five.^d

During the last ten years, midlife divorce has tripled.

One year after divorce, the average midlife woman remains single, with an average income of $11,300.

Over 58 percent of female baby boomers have less than $10,000 saved in a pension plan or 401(k).^e

Girlfriends, hormone replacement therapy is a women’s issue—and so is money. Just as we learn and take responsibility for our physical health, so we must also learn and take responsibility for our financial well-being. It is a cop-out to delegate the arduous role of managing our money to spouses; you both need to know what is being managed and how because there is an excellent chance that one of you will be left alone to manage your affairs at some point in your future.

Finding and maintaining balance doesn’t happen by accident. It is a purposeful, well-planned mission, one in which finances often play a pivotal role. Financial stability enables you to live your vision. If you are on solid financial footing, somewhere in life you made and executed a plan—allowing you the freedom to make choices today.

The master said, “Well done, my good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in handling this small amount, so now I will give you many more responsibilities. Let’s celebrate together!” (Matthew 25:23)

Choose a plan and be faithful to the plan.

^a David Bach, Smart Women Finish Rich (New York: Broadway, 2002), 36.

^b Ellen Hoffman, “Can Women Bridge the Retirement Savings Gap?” Business Week, August 11, 2008, http://www.businessweek.com/investor/content/aug2008/pi2008088_307392.htm?campaign_id=rss_null.

^c Don Kuehn, “Your Money,” AFT (May/June 2004), http://www.aft.org/pubs-reports/your_money/2004/0504.htm.

^d Bach, Smart Women Finish Rich, 26.

^e These final three statistics come from “Statistics and Aging Information,” The Senior Source, http://www.theseniorsource.org.