Women, assets, and the accumulation of Savings: A comparative analysis of ecuador, Ghana and India

Description

Ownership of financial assets is an important component of the path towards women’s economic empowerment. Savings serve as a reliable and convenient way to cushion against economic shocks while enabling women to accumulate the means to purchase productive assets. Using data from Ecuador, Ghana and the Indian state of Karnataka, this paper analyses which women have savings, the type of savings they hold and how these are related to both individual and household characteristics. The study finds a gender gap in the incidence of savings in favour of men, although the overall levels of savings are low for both men and women. The results suggest that women who are better educated, have paid employment and are members of groups are more likely to have formal accounts. It also finds that women’s ownership of immovable property, rather than household ownership, is strongly associated with their accumulation of savings in formal financial accounts.

Publication Date

1-1-2014

Publisher

Indian Institute of Management Bangalore

Keywords

Gender, Financial assets, Immovable property

Source Link URL

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7Tze4Hx-aKXemFaS1BPVUhMcnc/view

Link to Full Text

Share

COinS