PETALING JAYA: Women must build financial resilience early as financial insecurity remains a major barrier to Malaysia\u2019s gender equality agenda, say experts.<\/p>\n
This is key especially for young women and single mothers, who are the most vulnerable as rising living costs, career barriers and caregiving responsibilities continue to affect women\u2019s leadership opportunities and financial independence.<\/p>\n
Prof Dr Shanthi Thambiah from Universiti Malaya\u2019s Gender Studies Programme pointed out that increased labour participation is insufficient if women are underemployed and concentrated in low-paid, insecure, or informal work.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf many women are in informal or gig work, or in part-time roles without social protection, then household resilience remains weak, tax contributions remain limited, productivity gains are modest and gender inequality persists,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
On Friday, The Star reported that Malaysia is seeing a boost in its global gender parity scores due to women\u2019s increased economic participation and opportunity in the country.<\/p>\n
However, structural barriers persist to hinder the growth, including a widening wage gap between men and women.<\/p>\n
Women of Will (WOW) chief operating officer Zulikhwan Ayub said financial independence is essential for women to protect themselves against economic shocks such as divorce, unemployment or inflation.<\/p>\n
\u201cFinancial independence is no longer a luxury, it is the ultimate safety net.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor single mothers and young women entering the workforce, it is the only real barrier against cyclical poverty,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Young women especially need to start working on their financial independence early, not just to save for their retirement, but also to decouple their survival from external dependency, ensuring they have the autonomy to make choices about their own futures without being tethered to toxic or unsustainable circumstances, he said.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, for single mothers, he explained that the transition from a two-income household to one or moving from a dependent role to a provider role is fraught with structural failures.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe inability to secure affordable, safe childcare is the single largest barrier to employment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf a mother cannot work because she is the primary caregiver, she cannot build capital,\u201d said Zulikhwan.<\/p>\n
He added many women also end up having to balance caregiving duties with work in the gig economy or home-based businesses without safety nets such as the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) or Social Security Organisation (Socso) contributions.<\/p>\n
A 2025 Khazanah Research Institute study, \u201cInterwoven Pathways: The Care and Career Conundrum in Women\u2019s Empowerment\u201d showed that nearly nine out of 10 homemakers rely entirely on their husbands for financial support, leaving them vulnerable to separation and widowhood.<\/p>\n
Single mothers are also often left legally stranded due to the loss of legal or social support post-separation.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you combine this with the lack of enforceable alimony, you have a situation where the woman is left holding the full economic burden of raising children, often while battling the emotional and physical exhaustion that inhibits long-term strategic planning,\u201d said Zulikhwan.<\/p>\n
Sara Rizal, programme manager at the Social and Economic Research Initiative (SERI), said these systemic factors must be addressed in order to build financial security for women.<\/p>\n
For single mothers from lower-income households, savings often fall short of even three months\u2019 income, she said, making it difficult for them to cope with unexpected financial pressures while supporting children and managing household expenses.<\/p>\n
Women\u2019s career progression and earning potential are also affected by occupational segregation, the motherhood wage penalty and gender bias in the workplace.<\/p>\n
Wahine Capital co-founder Sherry Sheriff said changing family structures have made financial independence more important for women.<\/p>\n
The traditional assumption that women will be financially supported by spouses or children later in life is becoming less reliable as younger generations face their own financial pressures, including rising living costs and demanding careers,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Financial literacy among women also remains a challenge, the experts said.<\/p>\n
Even with many women managing household finances, they still tend to lack confidence in areas such as investing, credit management and long-term financial planning.<\/p>\n
To address these challenges, the experts emphasised the need for stronger policy support, including affordable childcare, improved financial education and workplace protections to ensure women have equal opportunities to advance their careers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PETALING JAYA: Women must build financial resilience early as financial insecurity remains a major barrier to Malaysia\u2019s gender…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464587,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[166649,84,166647,166648,4176,37690,9599,24203,11264,4174,4175,166650,166646,56,54,55,105421],"class_list":{"0":"post-464586","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-affordable-childcare","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-career-barriers","11":"tag-caregiving-responsibilities","12":"tag-finance","13":"tag-financial-independence","14":"tag-financial-literacy","15":"tag-financial-resilience","16":"tag-gender-equality","17":"tag-personal-finance","18":"tag-personalfinance","19":"tag-policy-support","20":"tag-single-mothers","21":"tag-uk","22":"tag-united-kingdom","23":"tag-unitedkingdom","24":"tag-wage-gap"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464586\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}