Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Wedding Scams Are On The Rise In China

And it's because of simple economics. Family planning policies which limited couples to one child along with a preference for boys has left a surplus of 32 million marriage aged men. So it is easier for a woman to pretend to want to marry a man. Once she receives a dowry, the scam artist can split. Men are so happy to have found a wife that they are not as careful as they should be. The price of brides has gone up and the savings rate of young men has gone up as they try to have enough money to get married. You can read all about it at It's Cold Cash, Not Cold Feet, Motivating Runaway Brides in China.

This is not a spam blog. I teach economics at San Antonio College in San Antonio, Texas. Click here to see my home page from by school.

2 comments:

Christopher B. Pugh said...

I think some of these men may have received a valuable lesson about marriage at a cost less equivalent to the actual institution of such.

How dysfunctional is the Chinese society though, at this moment, that such a hefty price is willingly paid for the mere opportunity of female companionship.

It's especially sad given the length of time the man in the article even knew the women who scammed him.

Cyril Morong said...

Christopher

Thanks for dropping by and commenting. The situation reported in this article is certainly dysfunctional. I guess every society is dysfunctional in some way, although some more than others.

Cy