According to a Bank of America report, financial well-being sentiment among Americans is rising, with 47% feeling financially secure compared to 42% a year ago. Joining Wealth! to unpack these findings is Bank of America's Head of Retirement and Workplace Benefits, Lorna Sabbia.

While the overall trend is positive, Sabbia highlights concerning disparities across gender and race. She notes that while the top-line number of financial well-being is important, "unpacking that and really understanding the demographics of a particular company are equally important."

The report reveals that 53% of men feel their financial well-being has improved, compared to 36% of women. Furthermore, Asian and Caucasian workers emerge as the most financially secure, with a noticeable decline among other racial groups, Sabbia says.

"Employers who are focused on pay equity topics and talking to their employees about it, obviously they're accessing the best talent. Everybody wants to work for a company that is going to pay fairly. It's just we need more companies to actually focus on that as well," Sabbia tells Yahoo Finance.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Wealth!

This post was written by Angel Smith

Video Transcript

A new Bank of America report finds more Americans today feel financially well than a year ago.

But the majority still have concerns about the cost of living increases here with more.

We've got Lorna Saba, who is the Sabia, excuse me, Lorna Sabia, who is the Bank of America head of retirement and workplace benefits.

My apology, Lorna, great to have you here with us first walk us into some of the findings here and what jumped out to you most notably.

Sure.

Thanks for having me.

First of all, we've been doing this research for the last 14 years and we basically look both at employers and employees sentiment.

And so like you said, financial wellness, folks are feeling better than last year.

So 47% this year said they feel more financially well versus 42% last year.

Some of the things that I wanna make sure are clear though within that, because there's a lot sort of tucked in is the difference between men and women is actually marketed.

And so 58% of men feel financially well, only 36% of women feel financially.

Well, that 17 point gap is actually the second largest that we've seen in the last 14 years.

So I'm a little concerned about that.

And if you even unpack that further, um, we see that Asian employees are actually most financially well, at 58% followed by white Caucasians at 50%.

And then it actually starts to, you know, deteriorate a little bit 36% and 35% for Black African American and Hispanics as well.

So I'm always concerned about, yes, the top line is important but unpacking that and really understanding the demographics of a particular company are equally important.

There's a lot, this study is rich, there's a lot in here that's, uh that's really compelling and caregiving is another topic in that regard.

Yeah, absolutely.

And, and Lorna, you, you broke down a few things within that.

I wanna dive first back into what you were mentioning on the gender front there and what we're seeing in terms of the disparity there.

Is there a leading cause right now?

Is it compensation?

Is it cost based?

What is it that kind of jumped out here?

Yeah, I think caregiving is at the top of the list.

And so probably if you look at since the pandemic, the caregiving topic is smacking women in particular.

It's a female topic.

And so, you know, when I think about that, that's probably first and foremost right behind it is exactly what you just said, which is pay equity.

And so you know, when you think about even a woman's life stage versus a man, it's just different.

Right?

Oftentimes caregiving, whether it's having Children, moving away from the workforce for a period of time that stops things like access to benefit programs like a 401k, it stops things like access to social security credits.

And we know that women live on average, five years longer, on average, they retire five years earlier and they have disruptions in their career.

And so you put on top of that, any disparity in pay that actually over a lifetime can translate to about a million dollars of wealth gap.

And so I think caregiving in particular and that pay equity topic, you know, it's, it's interesting we're finding even in the survey that employers who are focused on pay equity topics and talking to their employees about it, obviously, they're accessing the best talent.

Everybody wants to work for a company that is gonna pay fairly.

Um It's just we need more companies to actually focus on that as well.