‘The elder daughter phenomenon’: Edward Jones head Penny Pennington said the economy is propped up by eldest daughters

One of the biggest forces reshaping the financial services industry may not be AI, innovation or markets.

It may actually be related to who is responsible for keeping families financially organized: eldest daughters.

“The elder daughter phenomenon has to do with caregiving, and often has to do with becoming the executor on an estate,” Penny Pennington, the managing partner of financial services giant Edward Jones, told Fortune .

“Making decisions that extend across this family for more members of the family.” Pennington, herself an eldest daughter, said the responsibility is becoming more significant as trillions of dollars move between generations, a shift known as the “Great Wealth T ransfer .” She pointed to the roughly $100 trillion in wealth expected to change hands as older Americans pass assets to younger generations, saying the transfer is not just an investment but also a family event.

According to a report from Cerulli Associates, roughly $124 trillion will be transferred to heirs and charities between 2024 and 2048.

About $105 trillion of that is expected to go to heirs, and $18 trillion to charity.

Cerulli also estimates that women will receive substantial amounts of the transferred wealth, including roughly $40 trillion in spousal transfers and $47 trillion in transfers to younger women.

“Eventually, most of the wealth owned by older generations in the U.S. will be either donated or passed down to Gen X or Millennial heirs,” Chayce Horton, senior analyst at Cerulli Associates said in the report.

“With $85 trillion to be passed down to these generations collectively, providers that can establish relationships with, and adequately address the needs of, these younger investors will be well positioned for success.” Pennington said women already do much of the logistical work of family finances before they become the ones making investment decisions.

A 2024 Edward Jones survey conducted with Morning Consult found that two-thirds of American women describe themselves as their family’s “chief financial officer,” according to Pennington.

She said there remains a disconnect between women handling everyday financial responsibilities and men making many of the household’s investment decisions.

“The job involves an entire family, sometimes multigeneration,” Pennington said.

“The job is logistical, but it’s also emotional.” She suggested that “chief financial officer” might undersell what many women do, and that calling them “chief fulfillment officers” would be closer to their responsibilities.

“I do hope that in heterosexual couples the men step up a bit and take some of the burden off the women for shouldering all of this in the family,” Pennington added.