Gender, Marriage, and Asset Accumulation in the United States

Older women tend to be in more precarious financial situations than older men, and marital status plays an important role in determining the financial well-being of older women. Understanding the underlying causes of differences in life-cycle wealth accumulation by gender and family type is crucial to understanding the distributional implications of ongoing changes in pensions and proposed changes to Social Security. In this study, we will use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and the Survey of Consumer Finances to examine how and why the wealth of households varies by gender and family type.