Financy Women's Index

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

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

About Financy Women's Index

How we’re tackling Financial Inequality

The Financy Women’s Index™ (FWX) is a quarterly measurement of the economic progress of women and time frames to gender financial equality in Australia.

The FWX provides a snapshot on equality across 7 critical areas and includes both drivers and indicators of progress.

The drivers are Education and Unpaid Work. The indicators are Unpaid Work (dual), Employment, Underemployment, Pay, Board Leadership and Superannuation.

The purpose of the Women’s Index™ is to help drive fearless discussion and action among women, men and key decision makers in the public and private sectors.

The Index is an independent initiative of Financy Pty Ltd, which is advocates for gender financial equality and provides the IMPACTER software to improve organisations performance on diversity, equity and inclusion.

The Index is supported by the FWX Advisory Committee members; Dr Shane Oliver, Simone Cheung, Prof Roger Wilkins, Dr Leonora Risse, Bruce Hockman, Rhiannon Yetsenga and Nicki Hutley.

The Index is proudly sponsored by NGS Super, the Ecstra Foundation, Aspire Planning, Seven Consulting, Bespoke Co and PritchittBland Communications.

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.

Lastest Results

What do the latest results tell us about economic equality?

Progress to economic equality in Australia went backwards in 2023 as an increasing number of women were unable to work to their desired potential and continued to do the bulk of unpaid work, the latest Financy Women’s Index (FWX) shows.

Overall, the FWX fell 1 point (pt) to 75.5 pts out of 100 over the 2023 calendar year, with the December quarter (-2pts) firmly putting the brakes on progress.

The results were largely affected by a deterioration in the gender gaps in the Underemployment Rate (-1.56 pts) and Unpaid Work (-2.19 pts) which offset improvement in the Gender Pay Gap (+1.29 pts).

Key Results

  • Progress to gender equality went backwards in 2023 with the Financy Women’s Index (FWX) down 1 pt to 75.5 pts in the Dec qtr from 76.5 pts in Dec qtr 2022 due to worsening gender gaps in underemployment and unpaid work.
  • The gains in the first part of the year were erased by a 2-pt decline in the December quarter, down from 77.5 pts in Sept qtr 2023.
  • The FWX Unpaid Work sub-index worsened to 67.7 pts in Dec 2023 from 69.3 pts in Dec 2022 as men spent fewer hours than women doing unpaid housework and childcare.
  • In good news, the FWX Gender Pay Gap sub-index improved with the underlying gap in full time adult weekly earnings falling to a record low of 12% in the Dec qtr, from 13% in June qtr.

Financy Women’s Index by Quarter

Financy Women’s Index by Year

Years to Economic Gender Equality

The median timeframe to achieving total gender equality in Australia is 24 years. But the largest timeframe is 139 years based on progress rates in Education.

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Past Reports

Meet the FWX
Advisory Committee

The Financy Women’s Index is supported by an Advisory Committee, who believe in gender equality and the importance of measuring women’s financial progress. The Committee meets regularly to discuss the data findings and the best way forward for the Index to ensure it is as reliable and informative as possible.

The FWX Advisory Committee

Rhiannon Yetsenga

Manager Deloitte Access Economics
Rhiannon is a Manager in the Economic Analysis and Policy team within Deloitte Access Economics. She primarily works with clients in the Technology, Media and Telecommunications sector and leads Deloitte’s gender economics practice.

Dr Leonora Risse

Senior Lecturer in Economics at RMIT University

Leonora is an economist who specialises in gender equality. She is a Research Fellow with the Women’s Leadership Institute Australia and a co-founder of the Women in Economics Network in Australia. Her research focuses on evidence-based strategies to close gender gaps in economic outcomes.

Dr Shane Oliver

Chief Economist and Head of Investment Strategy at AMP
Shane has extensive experience analysing economic and investment cycles and what current positioning means for the return potential for different asset classes. He is also a highly sought after economics commentator for various media.

Nicki Hutley

Independent Economist
Nicki Hutley is a highly respected and sought after economist with a passion for social impact.
Simone Cheung

Simone Cheung

Partner in Deloitte Access Economics and leads the Health Economics and Social Policy team in NSW
She has over ten years of experience working in the intersection of government, private and the not-for-profit sector in improving health and social issues in Australia.

Bruce Hockman

former Chief Economist of the Statistical Services Group at the Australian Bureau of Statistics
Bruce has an economics degree from Adelaide University and he also did post-graduate studies at Macquarie University.

Prof Roger Wilkins

Deputy Director of the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic & Social Research at the University of Melbourne
Professor Wilkins is also the Deputy Director (Research) of the HILDA Survey and produces the annual HILDA Survey Statistical Report.