Women need 7% more super

The real issue here still seems to be one of equal pay for equal work. Its ridiculous in this day and age that women are still paid less for doing the same job. This needs to be fixed yesterday, as it is a very real form of discrimination. The rest though is really about choices. Hard choices to be sure, and I don't trivialise them. But choices rarely come without cost, and reduced superannuation saving after taking 5 years off work, would be one of them.

As for whether women should try to make up the gap by adjusting for higher risk investment strategies - that is a very slippery slope, fraught with uncertainty, and possibly inappropriate in many circumstances. Whether it spans the social equity gap depends on whether the assumptions you've made while constructing models in the safety of theoretical ruminations hold true.

Alternatively, women could insist that during their maternity leave, their partner's superannuation is equally split between the couple's funds.