Gender gap in pension literacy: Evidence from Italy

This paper examines gender differences in pension literacy in Italy, distinguishing between knowledge of the public pension pillar and knowledge of supplementary pensions. Using a cross-sectional survey of 2,436 working-age adults, we document a substantial raw gender gap in pension literacy. Once observable differences between men and women are taken into account, these characteristics explain roughly half of the gap, while the remaining half persists even after conditioning on observables. Our findings further show that the gender gap is not uniform across pension domains. Women remain significantly less informed about the public pension system, whereas the gap disappears in the case of supplementary pensions. These results suggest that women’s lower pension literacy reflects not only broader differences in financial literacy, but also a specific disadvantage in understanding the public pension system.