Role of Financial Literacy And Its Correlates On The Financial Well Being Of Working Women In Hyderabad

Abstract

SYNOPSIS newlineEmpirical studies across the globe have raised an alarm regarding low financial literacy levels and newlinehave reported a persistent gender gap. Women in India, among others, have emerged as prime newlinetargets of financial inclusion initiatives and standardized financial literacy education. However, if newlinepublic policy assumes women to be a homogeneous category and academia promotes a financial newlineliteracy-financial well-being (FL-FWB) model built on neo-liberal, efficient market theorizing, newlinethen do women s financial experiences truly get captured by this model? Does having own newlinefinancial resources truly empower a woman to achieve her own well-being? newlineThis critical constructivist mixed methods study has extracted latent levers of the FL-FWB newlinephenomenon operating in two disparate and independent empowered samples (urban, educated newlineand employed) by focusing on motivators and barriers to FL in an all women sample in quantitative newlinephase vis-à-vis results from an unrestricted sample in qualitative phase. The researcher uses data, newlinemethodological and theory triangulation to critique of the current FL-FWB model, questioning its newlinecore assumptions such as micro-positioning, capital market outcomes and homoeconomicus. The newlinestudy excavated the key outcome that FWB strategies are not limited to economic capital, but newlineinclude social and symbolic capital. Financial behaviour is not neither individualistic nor rational, newlinebut is situated in the mutual solicitation of position and disposition, power and struggle; oscillating newlinebetween harmony and dissonance due to the intersection of one s own mental structure and self- newlineidentity with the socio-economic strategies of others both external and internal drivers being newlineshaped and cemented by history and culture. Consequently, piecemeal FL training tied to financial newlineinclusion initiatives cannot create traction; representation is not akin to participation. newlineThe current FL-FWB model needs to be expanded and understood beyond mere economic newlineoutcomes, accommodating for psycho-socio-historical aspects of financial decision-making and newlineacknowledging the over-arching symbolic power exerted by the State, financial institutions and newlinepatriarchal households which impede possibilities for women and youth. The study reveals the role newlineof a regenerative habitus such that the individual self-socializes in order to participate in the social newlinegame of creation, accumulation and exchange of various forms of capital. The study synthesizes newlinethe analytical tools posited by Amartya Sen and Pierre Bourdieu to render a Capabilities Model of newlineFL-FWB Life-cycle. Through four distinct profiles of working women in this model (namely the newlineNovices, the Sentients, the Adroits and the Vulnerables), the study establishes that women s newline5 | Pagefinancial needs and financial experiences have stayed under-explored wrapped in the assumption newlineof homogeneity and that the reported gender gap in FL is a pernicious myth. The study begins with newlinea critique of the neo-liberal capitalist agenda that creates a financialized self and ends with the newlineunmasking of Masculine Domination within Indian households reproduced through resource newlinepooling, financial patriarchy and the rhetoric of the honourable man. Recommendations and newlinepathways to improve the agency-capabilities set for the various groups are made based on an newlineexpansive FL-FWB model and an appeal is made to revisit sources of knowledge to better validate newlinethe phenomenon of FL-FWB. newline6 | Page newline