Gender pension gap growing as women retire on £5,400 a year less than men

A report from the insurance firm, which employs more than 2,000 workers at its site near Stirling, shows that on average women expect to have about £14,450 a year to live on – the highest figure for women retiring in any year since Prudential’s survey started in 2008.

But while the situation for women is improving, the gender gap is also growing.

The gap between what female and male retirees expect to have as an annual income has increased by £600 over the last year.

This is because while women typically expect to be £150 a year better off than women who retired last year, men expect to be £750 a year better off on average than men who retired in 2015.

On average, men retiring in 2016 expect to have an annual income of £19,850 to live on – £5,400 more than women retiring this year.

Forty per cent of women retiring this year expect to have enough income to live comfortably, compared with 60 per cent of men.

Despite the boost to men’s retirement incomes, men retiring this year do not expect to have as much annual income as those retiring in 2008 and 2009, when the average man retiring in those years expected to have more than £20,000.

The retirement incomes people expect to have are made up of the annual amounts they expect to get from savings, the state pension, private pensions and any other investments such as property, according to Prudential’s survey of 1,000 people due to retire this year.

A Department for Work and Pensions spokesman said: “Since 2014, the gap in retirement incomes between men and women has actually fallen by £1,300.”