– Daniela Drake, M.D., attended Wellesley College and received an MBA from Stanford University. She, along with Elizabeth Ford, authored the book “Smart Girls Marry Money.” A former McKinsey consultant, she is now a full-time primary care physician. Drake married (for love) and has reaped the consequences. The views expressed are her own. –
I had to pause when I came across a blog out of South Africa that read, “I think a way forward, or backwards some of you might say, is to encourage our smart, savvy and capable daughters to marry for money.” Since I co-authored a book with a similar premise, this sassy assertion definitely grabbed my attention.
The blog’s author Jackie May, an editor for The Times world pages in South Africa, penned these seemingly heretical comments after learning of alarming research by Dr. Caroline Gatrell at Lancaster University in England. Dr. Gatrell found, “women who explicitly choose career over kids are often vilified at work.”
Huh?
Conventional wisdom says just the opposite: Sacrificing baby-making is often necessary in the calculus of getting ahead at work. Many mid-career women have forsaken motherhood to obtain career goals. Indeed, economist Sylvia Ann Hewlett made news a few years ago when she presented the statistic that 49% of mid-career women who made $100,000 a year or more were childless, compared to only 10% of men.
Yet, despite the sacrifices many women make in order to climb the corporate ladder, women are still woefully under represented in top executive ranks. Eight of the CEO’s on the Fortune 500 were women a couple of years ago. Now, two years later, we’ve got 12. At this rate it will take a little over 100 years for us to represent half of the CEO’s in the Fortune 500, in the year 2128.
Although the number of CEO’s is a lofty benchmark, in general even at the lower reaches, workplace parity is coming at a glacial pace. The reasons are complicated, and it isn’t just sexism. Many have suggested that it has to do with the choices women make to fulfill personal life ambitions.
Even today, many young women don’t foresee that these choices will affect their career success. Hewlett’s more recent national survey found that the typical young woman graduate plans to have a high paying job, take two to three years off to have children and benefit from career flexibility that lets her pop back in to the workplace when the mood strikes.
While Hewlett found the women’s optimism charming, she also noted that this generation follows hot on the high-heels of a generation of women who had similar ideas. By following non-linear career paths, that generation “lost 18…to 37% of their earning power,” and suffered a complete “downsizing of their ambitions.”
But the new graduates aren’t heeding the warning signs of the slightly more senior women’s failures.
These young women are counting on their talents to grant them repeated entrée into a marketplace they were brought up to believe is a meritocracy. The bad old days are behind us, as one co-ed commented to Hewlett, “Back then—when there were dinosaurs—people just did bad stuff to women.”
But is this true, or are people still doing bad stuff to women? If Dr. Caroline Gatrell’s study is right, women who have sacrificed important personal goals are penalized at work. As Gatrell’s study indicates: Childless women are viewed as lacking an “essential humanity” and viewed as unfit to manage others.
Yet at the same time Gatrell assures us that mothers don’t fare much better. Gatrell avers, “Women with children are blamed for combining motherhood with paid work and women with no children are sidelined and discounted because they are not mothers.”
The problem of women in the workplace is so complicated that the answers themselves sound like Orwellian double-speak. Or, have we at long last entered an age when double-speak simply means that both things can be true, that workplace discrimination can take on many forms and that there are no easy answers? But one thing is certain: achieving success in the workplace is like winning a competition. If half the entering team shows up thinking it’s something less than that, then men will still have the home field advantage—and achieving parity may take more than the 100 years estimated by my back-of-the-envelope calculation.
So what will I say if my daughter asks me, “How can I make sure my life is financially secure?”
I would have to pause before I answer. I would have to consider that in all likelihood she won’t live to see true workplace equality. But her life matters now. So I will have my own Orwellian answer for her and offer it with a hefty dose of irony, “Apply yourself at school and at work. And to cover all your bases, marry a man with money.”
If being "financially secure" is someone's highest goal in life, why shouldn't they marry for money? The trick is that since they pinned their hopes of being a complete human on an arbitrary, fickle, and narrow quality, they should not be surprised when they must sacrifice other goals to achieve it.
It's not neccessary to be rich to have a good life, though it helps.
Trackback
83 comments so far
Previous | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | Next
As a reproductive biologist, I think that the love for money is reasonable. Generally speaking, the female mammale always choose the supportive and steady male as their fixes partner, and this choice is benefit to her babies.
I am a man in my 30s, happily married and with children…
Men are dumb enough to be manipulated by girls until they turn 20. Adolt men, and finnacially attractive men are smart and experienced enough to understand women.
So, what men think is that one cannot buy emotions, one cannot buy love. And, believe me, men want love. If a girl doesn’t trylly love me, I would not have my children from her, it’s that simple.
Are women better off marrying for money?
Of course not. Just ask 30% of all women. The big money is in divorce.
Boom-boom!
There are just 10% (or less) of men are rich in the world,but there are some many women in the world, to bear down some many rivals and get the quota for the 10%, I don’t think it is easier than getting success in wworking. It is not a good idea!
Actually one is far better off marrying someone whom shares the same values, who wants to create an equal partnership. If you do that, the money will come. My parents are proof of that. You would have a “rich” life in every way that mattered, truly.
If the relationship is too lopsided in either direction and the parties do not have the same mindset, the likelihood of divorce is much higher.
As for the workplace, I work with many single and married parents and the majority of those had children at an early age. Thus, they lack financial security that one needs to enable being a good parent and provider. The real key to being rich is delaying parenthood, whether marriage turns out to be a factor or not.
I am male and 37 years old, I am not from America. I was married for 10 years, and divorced because we did not have any children.
There have been a lot of strong negative comments about this article, mostly from men. The author is correct, it is not easy to succeed in business and it is more difficult for women than men for a number of different reasons. My point is that she is correct, women do marry for money, but that does not mean they marry only for money. Love is a complicated and difficult thing to understand, love comes with time, and is based on friendship and mutual respect, as well as physical attraction. The way I understood her, the author meant that if you are a woman trying to decide whom to marry, if you are also thinking about financial security, then give some preference to the man with the good job, or the man with money over the man whose financial future seems uncertain. This is because you cannot easily achieve financial security by yourself, just as strong-working-mum says, she worked really hard just so that she and her son could survive without the help of any man (except Gordon Brown).
Financial security does not mean being a multi-millionaire, it means being able to support a comfortable lifestyle for yourself and family. The model (phoenix1) explained that these rich men will ‘eat you alive’, and she is right, it is impossible to become really rich without learning to ignore what does not matter (in many cases this means what your partner wants) while getting what you want. But I do not think the author of this article was talking about marrying a multi-millionaire.
Many posters have made allusions to prostitution, and how a woman that ‘marries for money’ is in some way a prostitute. I think these people do not really understand what prostitution is and how different the two ideas are. If a woman can marry a rich man, whom she cannot stand, only for finacial security, and she can live with him although she does not love him, then she has made some difficult choices, and has good control over herself, but she is not a prostitute, she is just somebody’s wife. There are two kinds of prostitutes, forced and by choice. Forced prostitutes are either drug addicts or are coerced by other illegal means. By choice prostitutes want a lot of money and independence at the same time, and they achieve both through paid sex with many partners. They are not attaching themselves to one man (or woman). The joke that someone posted is not really fair, almost anyone would have sex with someone they wouldn’t normally have sex with if they were offered a million dollars.
Considering the number of women who dream of being CEO isn’t that big, it seems to me that the author missed out on the most obvious solution: Women who don’t want to sacrifice their career for their children should marry men who do.
Also, her back-of-the-envelope calculation is stupidly calculated. Assuming a linear pattern is faulty because it leads to all Fortune 500 CEOS being women, and then there being more than 500 of them. The curve is more likely an exponential one that asymptotes near half in about 25 or 30 years.
Thank you for this article which summarizes many womens everyday experience.
One comment though: what about the “essential humanity” of women who marry for money, meaning sell themselves instead of on the job market on the meat market?
As a nation we are to large to be a sustainable democracy Christinemarie. We will inevitably become 5 or 6 smaller nations as did ancient Rome.
People in each region of the country are concerned with what effects them only. Flooding in the midwest, drought in the south and southwest, economic devestation in the rust belt etc, etc,…. “If it doesn’t effect me and my neighbors I don’t care”. The extremes of right and left have further divided us on issues of human rights, gun ownership, and religion.
If there is one unifying concern we can all agree upon is the abject failure of our elected representatives to lead not withstanding their habit for exercising all forms of corruption and indecency. Then again maybe this will the catalyst that will bring the demise of the Union.
Some very erudite comments. My one relevant personal experience was as an organisational troubleshooter in what admittedly was a particularly dysfunctional public sector organisation. I came across a pattern of behavior which was damaging to the organisation where a number of women holding fast to senior level director roles which they were not able to effectively perform whilst pregnant and after returning from maternity leave. Some were cynically relying on employment law as it relates to maternity as a defense against disciplinary proceedings to cheat the organisation and the taxpayer for a number of years. I don’t know the answer to this and directors taking advantage of organsations and taxpayers has no gender or public or private sector bias as the recent banking crisis proves. However, I could not see how someone can act effectively at a strategic level over a period of years and combine it with child bearing and rearing without a very significant infrastructure supporting him/her.
I’m a professional, educated, single parent who has worked full/part-time/free-lance/combinations of both, since my son was 3 weeks old, in order to provide financial security for myself & my son.I’ve had no maintenance from my son’s father.
The main reasons we survived financially without a man:
a) I’m an education professional & was in my late 30s & established before I got pregnant
b) I owned my own flat before I got pregnant
c) I benefited, at our leanest times, from Gordon Brown’s working tax credits-thank you Gordon for helping us at the worst times (& thanks from millions of other single parents)
It’s been at times a terrifying, lonely roller-coaster of always presenting myself as the ‘calm, well-dressed professional’ whilst coping with the stress of an ill/challenging child- employers don’t want to know about domestic problems.
However, although wer’e OK financially, we are very poor compared to my sister who never worked, had no quals beyond O levels but who married a rich man! And they get richer every year- as do their offspring,who seem to be left copious sons of money from various relatives…
Am I unusual- NO- I could introduce you to loads of similar, strong, professional, educated single working mothers…..all who’ve survived without marrying a rich man…EDUCATION is the key…not a rich man…
While, I seldom make comments on articles, especially assigned ones such as this article, but it is irritating how some people use statistics to promote their agenda. Moreover, when the agenda deals with race, ethnicity or gender a minimum amount of contextual information is needed or the article will be incredulous.
First off, no one would argue that the social problem of women being underrepresented in the work place is not important issues that must be addressed, however, statistics regarding CEOs of fortune 500 companies are not the same issue. The author is incorrect in using raw, random, uncontested statistics comparing Fortune 500 genders to equating to financial security…financial security is not financial apex.
Operating under the authors skewed statistical indicators, Obama should have tried out to succeed in professional sports and not run for president. Have we not left the 50’s mind set of women needing to marry for money? Better statistics would be what percentage of women marrying for money, actually procure such financial security. Inexplicably, the author left out the statistics of the women who married for money, foregoing pursuit of work and were then divorced and do not have financial security, one would presume in an era where the divorce rate is around 50% that such statistic may be equated into an analysis of marriage for money.
That article is not analysis it is not even true feminist propaganda, it is anti-male extremist spew. The President of the United States cannot even join the Country Club where the Masters Golf Tournament is played, so should he have not run for President?
Lastly, if someone gets married for money (money only), they become bought /property, so while, I don’t have an MD or a degree from Stanford, I do have the integrity to teach my daughter to marry for love and the sky is the limit for what she wants to achieve financially.
Great Article, great arguments, excellent reasoning…all or nothing statistics to promote points were extremely impressive, I guess since the author is not a CEO of a Fortune 500 Company, she should have married for money?
While I read the article these are the questions that crossed my mind
1. Is money everything in life?
2. What about the selfesteem of a woman who wants to spend somebody else’s money even if he is her husband?
3. Can all human beings man/woman make it to the top always. Is that the objective?
4. Women had a late entry point into these domains. Does it not take more time to establish and reach where they want to?
5. Have government policies not been changing to facilitate more and more women to work?
6. Do we need to compromise laziness for selfesteem?
7. Did the author think that men are dumb enough not to know your intentions?
8. Do men always fall for pretty faces or beautiful bodies? Are there no other expectations?
Well there can be nobody admirable than a women who has been able to manage here career, children and life equally well with a little effort and patience to seek cooperation. Men have also been changing and are more cooperative over the years. Is it hard for a woman to be herself?
Of course women should marry for money. So should men. On the other hand, don’t wait too long. It’s a little foolish for either a man or woman over the age of, say, thirty, when the looks and the body are starting to go, to expect to have the “value added” commodity that can command a price.
I would say this to young women: You must get the best quality education that you can afford, and you must apply it to a career for at least a dozen years before you even think about marriage and children; and even then, even if you have a great husband and job and an equal division of labor(and good luck with that)once the children are born there is a fundamental, permanent, and profound change in your life and your focus. Remember you are dealing with a million years of evolution here.
If you actually think you can marry a “rich man” and do whatever you want: as in “I want my own business” “I want to travel” “I want to manage investments” “I want to collect art”
You are dreaming babe. These men can have and do have whatever they want at any time. You play their game or they unload you in a heartbeat. They will eat you alive.
And not in a good way. Complete and total independence is best. Dealing with anyone from a position of strength is better.
Children are a beautiful blessing from God, but girls, kiss your life, as you know it, goodbye. Men have a much better deal when it comes to marriage. And childbearing years and career building years are the same. 25 to 40. And there you have it.
I had a modeling career, a stage career, and was actually in films before I had two kids in two years.
Five years later I became a writer and started my own business.
Profit making business.
It’s all rubbish.
But if a woman is to marry, she must consider the financial aspects of setting a house with a shared income: any previous debt from both sides, for instance, and the capability to a stable economic married life. But that doesn’t mean she has to marry some rich guy - who may prove reckless with money, drag her into debtland and is not straightfoward in affection or anything else, for that matter.
If a woman choses not to marry and not to have children, her choice must be respected; she is no less of a human being for it. Same as with a man.
I find, many times, married women with children at work to be overbearing and overconfident that they are better bossing around because they have kids, especially when it’s a fact their kids have them wrapped around their finger, they took an epidurial, and have them in day care from month 1.
I don’t care for people who marry for the social aura it gives them, or as an excuse to throw a party - but not as a committment to last more than a few months.
The silly aspect of it is that you can marry poor but have the intelligence to build up to a sizeable estate together, and one must also consider that it’s the intelligence and the educational level that many women and men go for. College grads marry college grads because they have their education, intelligence and overall culture in common, though they are in debt paying for their school loans.
Perhaps the “Desperate Housewives” and silly series about Manhattan women have gone to the heads of writers and readers alike.
Here’s the deal:
In the postmodern age, which is well beyond the era of socialism in a Marixst analysis of history, there is an immense saturation of media images that portray different ways of living, including a woman’s role in society. The United States and Europe have education programs, government advertising, and financial incentives designed to dissuade people from having too many children for the purposes of population control. This is considered to be better than the African alternative, which is a child mortality rate of nearly 30%. Since over-population ranks at the top of the list on the ruling classes world problems list, it isn’t really surprising.
You should probably just not get married unless you are planning on raising children and have a good idea about how you are going to do it right. You really shouldn’t have wanton sex outside of marriage either, but with the spectacle driven into the ecstatic, I suppose sexual relationships can be a refreshing, real, and healthy experience and are positive for many people without causing too much stress or drama. lol
The libido is certainly stimulated to the extreme in post-modern societies: there is of course natural animal attraction and a natural urge to have children, but in addition, media images saturate not only absurd and alluring fashions, but also flatter romanticism and simplicity.
It’s not like you have free will anyway, too bad your freedom to choose who you marry really is decided money and not your romantic notions.
The grass is always greener on the other side…
Most women want what they can’t have. (same with most men too).
I am a new father and all I want to do is spend more time with my child. Most people feel the same I me but there are many who are power hungry or just plain greedy. They covet more than what will make them just simply happy.
I think the Rolling Stones sang it best with “You can’t always get what you want…but if you try sometimes, you find out you get what you need…”
Hell, I’d love to have my wife work and me stay home. She’d be my “Sugar-mama”. I hate my job but I have to do it.
Being in my late twenties, struggling to be financially stable and wanting to have kids in the near future, I can understand her point. I grew up wanting what my mother had; she took three years off to have kids, then got into her career and now makes more than my husband and I combined yearly - and good for her. Unfortunately, I don’t see my future being so successful, at least not at the moment. There was a middle class back then, and overall life was much more affordable, but not anymore. I chose to married someone I loved, but marrying for money could offer many opportunities that aren’t guaranteed in my choices in life such as healthcare, ownership of real-estate, savings, vacations, etc.
And in regards to women in the workplace, women definitely have an advantage…or disadvantage, depending if you want to sleep your way to the top. Sexual harassment is all too common in the workplace and is a significant problem for women my age. So, I suppose much of success is centered around how much you want to compromise yourself.
Overall, I feel like it’s a loose/loose situation for women in my generation - at least in America. The only reason I want to be successful in my career is to provide for a family, but if I take time off to have kids, I can’t afford them, and even if I just want to have some success in business and no kids, I need to compromise my values and marriage…?? All I have to say…I look forward to all the baby-boomers retiring; I’ll get to move up the economic food-chain without sleeping my way to the top, and I’ll get grandma to watch the kids when I go back to work.
Not many want to hear the truth, The article in my opinion, is correct. Not only do women marry for money, but many men do too. We women just don’t want to talk about it. Fear that if we did, we would be called not “smart” but “stubid”.
Women do not help each other to achieve success because of jealousy. Men do help each other more; that is one reason that you don’t hear about men who marry for money. Men defend each other and build each other up.
It is no wonder that we have CEO’s and high level executives from different country’s. American’s simply don’t help each other as we really should to create a better America.