THE squeeze on household budgets has led to women placing a smaller share of their income into pension savings, but men are managing to put a larger proportion of their income aside.

The gender gap has widened over the past year with the average amount men are putting aside after tax increasing from 9.7% to 10.2%, but for women there has been a reduction from 8.8% to 7.5%, a Halifax survey found.

Male pensioners already tend to have higher incomes than female pensioners.

Single male pensioners had an average net income after housing costs of £240 per week in 2009/10 compared with £208 for single women pensioners, the study said. Women were more likely than men to say they were spending a lot more on household groceries then they were a year ago, at 14% compared with 8% of men, the study said.

Women were also more likely than men to say they are spending less on going out and treating themselves, as well as less on clothes, than they were a year ago. The findings come just a few months before the Government’s landmark scheme to tackle the pension savings crisis by automatically placing up to 10 million people in workplace pension schemes, beginning this October.

In 2011, average male earnings were £36,511 – 35% higher than average female earnings of £27,006.