Let’s Talk About Money

by Zoe Cruz (New York City)

It’s happening in affluent families all over the country. It’s “the talk.”

“Honey, now that you and Dave are getting engaged, let’s have a talk.”

“Mom, we’ve been living together for a year now…that ship has sailed.”

“No, honey, not THAT talk. Let’s talk about money.”

“Mom, can’t we talk about sex instead?”

Women and Company, a membership service provided by Citi that provides financial education and related resources intended for informational purposes, commissioned Synovate to conduct an eight-month long survey of more than 1,000 affluent women–those with household investable assets of $100K or more–between the ages of 40-70. The newly-released resulting study, Women and Affluence 2008: A Generational Study revealed that finance is now the number one topic of discussion between affluent women and their daughters.

Among other things, the study states that the major concern these women have for their daughters–above sex, drugs and even politics–is that they, too, learn how to manage their finances and achieve their financial goals. When asked, 94% of the subject women said they discussed financial topics with their daughter(s), compared to 52% who said their mothers discussed the same information with them a generation before.

Across the board, these women believe that the hard work, discipline, and intelligence are the key traits of successful women. 96% said women are becoming more involved in financial decision-making for themselves and their families. 63% of those surveyed consider themselves to be the CFO of their household. 53% of these women said that their mother was also the CFO, 75% believe their daughters will follow in their footsteps.

Women & Co.’s President and Chief Operating Officer, Linda Descano states, “Our survey finds that a dialogue across the generations is a fundamental building block of financial knowledge and confidence for women…the results indicate that today’s affluent women have far surpassed their mothers in financial acumen–and decision making responsibility. Despite a lack of female financial role models, affluent women empowered themselves and are committed to being a positive financial role model for their daughters.”

Where earlier generations of women seemed highly concerned that their daughters would “marry well”–marrying men who were not only kind, but those who were known as “good providers”–the increase in working and professional women has shifted the aforementioned dialogue from “how much does he earn?” to “how are you managing what YOU earn?”

Reports in financial and insurance publications regularly point to the lack of women at the top of companies, to the wage gap between women and their male colleagues of the same age and experience, and to the importance of gender differences in investment decisions. The Department for Professional Employees estimates that the number of working women is projected to reach nearly 76 million by 2014. The increase of professional women from 2004 – 2014 is expected to rise by more than 21%. Yet regrettably, there are few role models for the generation now making the decisions.

The beauty of this though is that you don’t need to be affluent before you learn the language; you need to learn the language in order to become affluent. Anyone can find a mentor and/or the resources to educate yourself about money, and then educate your children. By becoming “fluent” in the language of money can, you can help your daughters (and your mothers for that matter) make better financial decisions.