When Women Earn More Than Men, Is Dating Affected?

The New York Times had an articled titled Putting
Money on the Table on Sept. 23. It seems that problems arise when a women makes alot more than her boy friend. Sometimes the men don't like it when the women pay for things. Other times women try to hide how much money they make. One woman said that it is "easier to date someone in the same economic bracket." Some women think if the man does not make alot of money that he is not ambitious enough.

With many women making more than men, it is hard to share common interests. If you make alot of money and want to go to the opera and fine restaurants, it helps if the other person can also afford to do so. This raises another issue: Can you have any kind of friend, not just the dating type of friend, who has an income that is not much different than yours? Suppose you like bike riding and you want to join a bike riding club. But if everyone in the club owns expensive bikes that are very light and fast, you can only keep up with them if you also buy an expensive bike. So you have to spend money to keep up. If you don't, there is no point in being in the club since you will just end up being way behind everyone else and the others won't want to go real slow so you can keep pace. My guess is that most people have friends who make a similar amount of money.

But getting back to men, women, incomes and dating, if women have trouble dating men who make less, but it is okay for men to date women who make less, then men have a larger group of potential dates: the women who make as much as they do and the women who make less whereas women who make alot can only date men who make as much. That narrows their field and total number of potential dates, maybe even husbands.