A recent study by LendEDU found that only 6 percent of women reported their college tuition had been nearly paid in full by their parents. Ten percent of men reported that their tuition had been paid largely by their parents. The survey found that 50 percent of women college graduates did not receive any financial assistance from parents. But only 43 percent of male college graduates said that their parents did not contribute to the cost of their college education.
An earlier survey conducted by T. Rowe Price, found that parents who only had girl children saved less for college than parents who had only male children. Half of boy-only households saved for their sons’ higher education compared to 39 percent of parents who only had girl children.
“A willingness to save more, pay more, and borrow more among parents of all boys suggests there may still be some antiquated expectations based on gender. This is somewhat ironic as more women are attending and graduating from college now than men,” says Roger Young, a senior financial planner at T. Rowe Price.
Wow! I knew this to be a historical fact, but that it still continues today is shocking. It would be interesting to see if this contemporary pattern is related to parental perceptions of responsibility regarding their adult children. However, even such a study doesn’t shed light on differential patterns of saving for college education over the student’s childhood. Do we still believe (consciously/ subconsciously) that our women children will be taken care of by men eventually, and therefore we do not need to invest as much in them?