Financy Women’s Index

The Women’s Index measures the financial progress of Australian women and economic equality.

Financial inequality is a major obstacle to the progress of women, families and future generations.

To help tackle this, each quarter the Financy Women’s Index (FWX) measures and tracks financial progress and economic equality across seven areas that are important to the advancement of Australian women.

The data and the commentary contained in each quarterly report is designed to give individuals, media, business leaders and government timely insights into the challenges and opportunities that relate to women’s financial wellbeing in Australia.

The Index is supported by Deloitte Access Economics, which provides economic modelling and analysis to assist with the development of the Index and Reports.

Data contained in the Report is reviewed by the Women’s Index Advisory Board; Dr Shane Oliver, Nicki Hutley, Roger Wilkins, Joanne Masters and Bruce Hockman. The Index is also reviewed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The Index is very much made possible with the sponsorship support of Deloitte, OneVue and AMP.

Creative works are produced by We Are Why Pty Ltd.

Ultimately, the purpose of the Index is to help inspire women to live more courageously and confidently – to be Fearless.

Are things getting financially better for women?

Australian women advanced their financial progress in the March quarter of 2021, recovering from a disappointing finish to 2020 because of the Coronavirus pandemic.

While this is good news, we remain cautiously optimistic, as the health crisis has caused many wild swings and distortions in economic data and we really need to wait for the dust to settle to get a clear read on the long-term impacts on women’s financial security and gender equality.

The Financy Women’s Index rose by 0.7 points to 71.6 points in the March quarter, and is up 1.8 points on March 2020. The result has been driven by new data updates across the three sub-index areas: employment, underemployment and leadership.

Employment data shows a record increase in female workforce participation, as well as a high in the number of monthly hours worked.

We have also seen a a narrowing of the gender gap in the underemployment rate and a fresh high in women holding ASX 200 board directorships.

The combined result suggests that women are experiencing a somewhat faster employment recovery from the jobs fallout caused by the pandemic than men helped by a significant rebound in female-dominated sectors such as Retail and Accommodation and Food Services.

Women aged 35-64 years have seen the strongest recovery in full-time work, outpacing men.

While we are yet to see a recovery in the full-time employment numbers of young women aged 15-34 years, which takes into account the average age for starting a family, the correction that has occurred has also been stronger than that of men.

Key Results

The Financy Women’s Index rose 0.7 points to 71.6 points in the March quarter, shaking off the worst quarter in eight years for women’s financial progress in December 2020.
Year-on-year the Women’s Index rose 1.8 points or 0.8%, which is the strongest start to a calendar year since 2018.
The score was helped by a strong recovery to the COVID-19 setback in female employment and a further improvement in the number of women occupying directorships on ASX 200 companies.
The timeframe to achieving total gender equality in Australia remains at 101 years based on the worst-performing sub-index, unpaid work.
The timeframe to achieving gender equality in employment (sub-index) fell to 30 years in the March quarter, down from 34 a year earlier – the slowest annual growth rate since 2018.

Financy Women’s Index by Quarter

Financy Woman’s Index by Year

View All Key Results

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