Today, I presented research on the cost of menopause at the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank as part of the Institute of Economic Equity Series.
My presentation focused on women aged 40 to 60 in the labor force who did not have employer-sponsored health insurance. I chose to focus on this group because if the employer does not offer health insurance, they will likely not provide paid sick leave. This is a crude proxy and likely overstates wage loss due to menopause symptoms for married women or women who are not the primary insurer.
According to Table 1, the wage loss for women with children is estimated to be approximately $750 million, which likely overstates the loss to married women.
Table 1. Estimates of Wages Lost for Women by Employer-Sponsored Health Status, Marital Status, Race/Ethnicity & Children
Source: 2023 Annual Social and Economic Supplement, Current Po[ulation Survey. Methodology Faubion, MD, MBA, et al., 2023
A key point from our discussion is that the economic cost of menopause is not a single-year cost. On average, women may experience symptoms related to menopause that affect their productivity for 8 to 10 years. Hiedi Hartman, founder of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, suggested calculating the lifetime loss to women as a result of menopause.
Stay tuned for my blog with Anna Kent about the economic cost of menopause for women and their families.
We are on a staff retreat next week. WISER Wednesday will return June 19th.
