The good news for women: They live longer, so they’ll have longer to enjoy their retirement. The bad news: They live longer, so their retirement will be much more expensive than for their male counterparts.

Women tend to outlive men. Only one-third of women over sixty-five are married and, on average, women will survive their husbands by fifteen years. The combination of being on your own and living longer means that you’ll need far more retirement income than most men will.

Unfortunately, women's pension plans just don't measure up. A study by the Older Women's League says that women only receive 54% as much private pension income as men and they are falling further and further behind. There is a simple reason for this: The pension you receive depends on whether you stay on the job.

Today, more and more women are leaving the work force because of layoffs, poor job prospects or to spend more time with their families. On average, women are out of the work force for at least ten years while men, on average, take just one year out of the work force.

Women often think that they can rely on their husbands' pensions, but they are wrong. Let's assume that a couple is living on the man's pension and the woman dies. Though grief-stricken, the husband suffers no financial detriment and goes on collecting his full pension. But let's say the husband dies first, as is ordinarily the case. His wife will probably get only 50% survivor benefits, which won't come close to providing her the income she needs to carry on her lifestyle. No wonder 41% of older women are living close to the poverty line. Not surprisingly, most widows who are poor now were not poor before their husbands died.