Hong Kong: Where Women Make the Money

Imagine a place where the number of rich women outnumber men. It exists. In Hong Kong.

Ten years after China took over rule of the former British colony, according to a recent survey by Citibank, the number of Hong Kong women who are millionaires rose to 51% of all millionaires. From Monsters and Critics news section:

The annual Citibank survey found that for the first time, women were a majority of those residents with liquid assets of at least 1 million Hong Kong dollars (128,000 US dollars).

An estimated 276,000 people in the former British colony, population 6.8 million, are now Hong-Kong-dollar millionaires, 51 per cent of them women.

The study also found that Hong Kong’s millionaires are 40 per cent richer than a year ago, with average total assets including property and other holdings, of 12.8 million US dollars.

Explaining the trend toward women millionaires, Citibank executive Weber Lo told the South China Morning Post, which carried the survey, that it reflected Hong Kong’s egalitarian society.

‘Many women work in senior positions and are independent, with high earning power,’ he told the newspaper. ‘It is inevitable that the financial return of women from their jobs is higher than before.’

Does that mean women don’t work as hard in America or Britain? In the United States, women make 77 cents compared to every dollar a man makes. Makes it harder to become a millionaire.

Maybe more Hong Kong women are single and therefore their income isn’t interrupted by childbearing? The survey didn’t seem to indicate that was the case:

The survey found that 88 per cent of millionaires are married, 82 per cent invest in stocks, 75 per cent own property and 64 per cent read a newspaper business section of a newspaper every day.

Clearly, Hong Kong knows something that other cities does not: How to get women to perform at their peak performance.

It is a lesson that many other countries, especially in the Middle East where women are shunted into the back room, would be wise to heed. But will they? It’s hard to compete is half of your talent isn’t even in the game.