Gender Differences in Pension Investment: The Role of Biased Advice

with Claudia Curi (Free University of Bozen-Bolzano), Andreas Dibiasi (Free University of Bozen-Bolzano), Matteo Ploner (University of Trento)

Using data from different pension funds in Italy, we document a gender gap in pension investments. We show that women in their twenties contribute roughly the same amount of their salary to their pension fund but choose a less volatile investment line with lower average returns. In an attempt to explain the origins of this gap, we conducted a survey experiment among pension fund advisors and found that advisors are more likely to recommend a less volatile asset allocation to women than to men. Finally, with the help of the geographic distribution of biased advice, we corroborate a potential link between biased advice and the gender investment gap in the pension fund data.