Saturday, January 12, 2008

How (Not) To Marry A Millionaire

This article has so much wrong with it it's hard to know where to start. But lets run in the order the article says these things.

Firstly a survey reveals 75% of women say they "would marry for money". Now that's not much of a statistic because we don't know:

1) How much money - millions? billions? a tenner?
2) How much compromise they would make for this money? Would they have to like the guy too? Fancy him?
3) How poor were they to start with? I mean sure I'd marry for money rather than watch myself and my own kids starve. Who wouldn't?

But lets go along with the number anyway. Now Karen Barichievy, our resident expert, explains that she dated a rich guy for four years. And based on her survey of, erm, one rich guy she informs us that they all don't like to go out and party. In fact "for nearly four years I had a 10pm curfew. My (now ex) banker boyfriend insisted on it.". Curfew? that ain't a boyfriend - that's a slave-owner.

She continues to expand on what all wealthy men are like based on her survey of, as I mentioned, only one such man. They have a limited sex drive, are anally retentive about household organisation and wear CK undies and Patek watches. So now you know. Then apparently they'll take you on flash holidays and ignore you in favour of chatting away on a Blackberry the whole time. Anyone think Ms Barichievy's boyfriend just didn't really like her all that much?

Eventually she realised that "such men will always love their money and their jobs more than you". Another bold conclusion on the basis of a single specimen. In defence/critique of men both rich and poor... Some poor guys might love their Playstation more than they love you, or their Internet porn. And some rich guys might love you, and you might actually be the kind of person who gives their partner enough space to have a career as well as a relationship.

Having "realised" this our unlikely heroine joined a dating agency for millionaires (against her own declared interest) and was disappointed to find that the guys she was introduced to weren't a great match for her hobbies and interests - which after all her puff about how rich guys like to be tidy and organised included "spit and sawdust pubs and camping". Except that she'd already insisted on one big criteria - she only wanted to meet millionaires. Maybe the problem was this: the average dating agency doesn't have thousands of clients - they have to introduce you to someone.

I've always thought the best plan was to make money myself, rather than trying to date it out of people. But I can sympathise with people - guys or girls - who consider it a bonus in a potential partner, who wants to be penniless? Of course Ms Barichievy knows this herself - presumably why she's writing piffle easy-to-sell articles for The Times.

1 comment:

Iceman said...

I've met investment bankers who can't figure out why women aren't all over them! And lawyers who complain that hot gold diggers only want doctors and Wall Street guys!

Why would an intelligent, interesting, successful woman want a man who has nothing going for him other than money, has no interests outside of work, and has almost no time to spend with a partner? This doesn't describe all rich guys, but it describes a lot of them. And the women that type of guy does attract tend to be trashy and just want a sugar daddy.

If anything, having two partners with vastly unequal earnings can make a relationship difficult. The high earning partner often worries about being used for money, while the low earning partner often worries about not being respected.