Invest Like A Modern Woman
Recently, I wrote about Ellevest CEO, Sallie Krawcheck, and the promotion of their hashtag "disrupt money" and slogan "invest like a woman" on my steemit.
Since writing that post, I've read, watched, and thought more on the topic to sort through the frustration I feel about a company claiming to want to disrupt money and gain financial parity for our gender.
Financial Parity is a long way off. People in crypto, largely men, are gaining wealth at a rate that is unprecedented in modern times.
In the responses to my post, I was told things like:
"Women like investing with Ellevest because they're more conservative in their investments"
"Women aren't interested in investing or crypto"
"Most women don't make investment decisions and don't want to"
Women Invest
The message from Ellevest is clear. Women do make investment decisions. Women are interested in investing. Women must invest and invest with their goals in mind.
It baffles me that, with the aggressive goals of Ellevest regarding financial equality as a whole, crypto is being overlooked at the investment level.
I was watching a video on the topic on Facebook and it all clicked when I saw this tweet:
If you don't know who Alexia Bonatsos is, you should look up her early coverage of startups like Uber.
1792
Some women are so focused on the old ways of investing, the ways financial inequality happened, that they don't realize there are new ways. Using the same methods that were used to put us in this position won't work. Yes, we can gain ground, but we won't achieve equality this way. It's an inch at a time when we need miles.
First, because a matriarchal society with strict gender roles and men as possessions is not going to happen to level the playing field, nor would any true feminist want it to. (Yes, feminism is about equality, not hating men).
Second, the conditions that put a huge amount of wealth in men's hands are not re-occurring in the same markets (like everything since the launch of the NYSE in 1792). I'm not waiting hundreds of years. I'm not waiting decades.
No More Unicorns
We have a unique opportunity, the existing financial system is just beginning to lose ground to crypto. It isn't happening super fast and the promotion to those outside of the crypto world is minimal, with most advertising dollars being spent to market to those already in the industry. It is happening though.
In 2013, I was a woman in tech invested in stocks who bought Bitcoin. In 2018, I'm less of a unicorn, which is amazing. I used to not know any other women in crypto. Now there are lists, there are groups, there are hangouts, and meetups, and thousands of women investing in crypto dragging our gender closer to financial equality by miles, not inches.
Women Work It
It's also worth mentioning that this is a new industry. Finance and tech both have issues with equality and crypto as a combination of the two struggles as well. The massive amounts of money entering the field add to the importance of women not only investing in but being represented in the industry. Woman developers and founders, like Taylor Monahan, CEO of MyCrypto, co-founder of MyEtherWallet, are leading the way.