Here's how Trump Accounts could affect women's retirement savings gap

Bojanstory | E+ | Getty Images Trump accounts — set to officially launch July 4 — are aimed at helping the youngest Americans get an early start on building long-term financial security through investing. Whether that will reduce the retirement savings gap that women face is less certain, experts say. Research shows that although women save more of their paycheck than men, their 401(k) account values are lower. The average balance among men at the end of 2025 was $194,597, compared with $146,476 for women, according to Vanguard's new 2026 How America Saves report. This is at least partly due to earning less on average — 81 cents for every $1 earned by men, per the Labor Department — and spending more time out of the labor force due to family caregiving, experts say. Three in five caregivers are women, according to a 2025 report from AARP and the National Alliance for Caregiving, a nonprofit advocacy and research group. More from Women and Wealth: "While Trump Accounts provide early access to investing and the benefits of compounding, it wouldn't solve [the problems] that are driving the gender gap in retirement balances," said Anqi Chen, associate director of savings and household finance at the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. At the same time, there may be an indirect positive impact on women's retirement savings, said Teresa Ghilarducci, an economics professor at The New School in New York. …