Did you know the name 401(k) is a reference to the tax code provision for those retirement savings accounts? Yeah, me neither. Or that the annual maximum employee contribution is $23,500? I’d probably heard that somewhere, but it didn’t seem like information I would ever need.
In a nation where women weren’t allowed to have their own credit cards or take out business loans until a few decades ago, is that a surprise? Financial systems were built to serve white men, and the world of investing still reflects that history.
Enter Amanda Holden. Even while working in investment management, she found herself trapped by cycles of spending and feeling shackled by her debt to a job she didn’t enjoy. Until she stepped back and said, Wait. I’m a slave to these systems. I need to save, invest and use my money to live the life I want.
In How To Be a Rich Old Lady: Your Guide to Easy Investing, Building Wealth, and Creating the Wild, Beautiful Life You Want, Holden outlines how women (and any other readers) can map their own paths to financial freedom. This isn’t your father’s investing book. Men are very much invited on the journey, but Holden’s passion is coaching women, who typically haven’t had easy access to this kind of guidance.
Holden points to a study about gendered language in media: The majority of articles about money in women’s magazines describe women as over-spenders, and almost 90% of coverage focuses on how to save. By contrast, 70% of money media directed at men emphasizes how to invest and make money. She flips this approach by empowering women, writing to them like a caring big sister who wants to share the secrets she’s learned.
Holden’s advice takes time to work through; I read this book with pen and paper in hand and 401k.com at the ready. She ends chapters with “10-Minute Missions” to help readers put her advice into action. My retirement savings already reflected the tips she offers, but How To Be a Rich Old Lady helped me understand why the asset allocation in my target retirement fund is what it is. Demystifying finance, the book equips readers with next steps, regardless of whether they’re decades into saving or just opening their first account.
The journey is individual. If you want to get your spending under control, Holden outlines what to do in black and white. If you can’t tell a Roth from a traditional IRA, she clearly explains the differences. If you’re approaching the individual 401(k) limit, Holden will help you identify your next investment steps. If the ethics of the funds you invest in are top of mind, she’s got you covered, too. How To Be a Rich Old Lady is a smart, quippy, easy-to-digest guide to investing. I’ll definitely share it with many of the women in my life.