How hybrid roles and flexible working are widening women’s wealth gaps

Flexible working was meant to level the gender playing field. Hybrid and remote roles have helped many women balance paid work with caring responsibilities who might otherwise have left the workforce.

But when breaking down flexibility by pay grade, a divide becomes clear.

Senior, higher-paid roles are still less likely to offer flexibility, while lower-paid and part-time roles are more likely to. Experts warn it is not flexibility itself that is the problem, but the unequal way it is distributed.

For International Women’s Day on 8 March, The Independent looks at how unequal access to flexibility – rather than flexibility itself – is shaping women’s long-term financial security.

Dr Sara Reis, deputy director at the Women’s Budget Group, says the issue is structural. “The issue here is not flexible work,” she says. “The lack of access to it in senior, well-paid roles is.

“Women still do 50 per cent more unpaid care than men, and so are more likely to take up jobs that offer flexible working in order to better combine their unpaid caring responsibilities with their paid job.

“But right now, we see that flexibility is more often than not concentrated in lower-paid jobs with limited progression. That imbalance has consequences for women’s earnings, pensions and long-term financial security, and gender equality more broadly.”

In practice, many women opt for school-hour or remote roles, while senior posts remain less accessible.

The result is a widening pay and pension gap.

Jeannie Boyle, director and chartered financial planner at EQ Investors, says even modest salary differences can snowball. “Lower salaries mean lower pension contributions,” she says. “Someone earning £100,000 over a 20-year period can expect to accumulate an additional £70,000 in their pension fund compared to someone earning £80,000.

“This assumes they are both paying five per cent of their salary into pensions, which grow at 10 per cent a year. What’s harder to assess is how the higher salary attached to more senior roles impacts the ability to invest for the future.”

The gap widens significantly if higher earners increase contributions as their pay rises. “It’s only when salaries start to accelerate that many people have the capacity to make significant savings into pensions and ISAs,” Boyle says.

“When people are promoted into senior roles, they find they can afford to increase pension contributions. If the person earning £100,000 a year can afford to contribute 10 per cent into their pension, the gap after 20 years widens to over £350,000.”

Hybrid working has also altered workplace dynamics. While flexibility can improve work-life balance, it may reduce visibility – something that still influences promotion decisions.

Boyle says: “Men, often with fewer responsibilities at home, focus on building the networks that help them move into senior roles. They are exercising influence by being in the room for the post-meeting chat, available for after-work drinks, and accepting the invitation to watch rugby at the weekend.

“For women working at home or part-time around childcare, these opportunities aren’t available. Women are finding that competence will take them so far in their careers, but it isn’t enough to reach more senior roles, and their careers can stall at the middle level.”

Both experts stress that restricting flexible working is not the answer. “Doing that would only make it harder for women to stay in work,” says Reis.

“The real challenge is ensuring flexibility is genuinely available across all levels of seniority, and to remove stigma so that people who work flexibly or hybrid are not penalised because managers favour those who are most visible in the office rather than those delivering results.”

She adds that flexible working is particularly important for disabled women and those with chronic health conditions, for whom rigid patterns can be a barrier to employment.

The Employment Rights Act is expanding access, but Reis argues more could be done, including a requirement for jobs to be advertised as flexible by default unless not reasonably feasible.

For women who choose flexibility, or rely on it, proactive financial planning matters.

“Employer support and engagement is critical to career success if you are working in a different way to most of your colleagues,” Boyle says. “Try to work for a female-led organisation without the boys’ club mentality.”

She also emphasises maintaining contributions where possible. “Try to ensure you are investing for the future, even if budgets are tight,” she says. “You may not be able to rely on a big salary uplift later to give you more savings capacity.”

As International Women’s Day prompts reflection on economic equality, hybrid working presents both opportunity and risk. Unless flexibility is embedded at every level, it risks entrenching the very wealth gaps it was meant to close.

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