Not just a quick flip, the old-school days of working hard and being a loyal employee are long over. When the more steady routes of gaining wealth are increasingly out of reach, gambling becomes more enticing.
Why be a loyal employee if you get fucked the first chance the org gets?
I know plenty of old-school companies that treat their people remarkably well and loyalty goes both ways. But I struggle to think of a new-schools tech company that won't exploit an employee's naivety.
When I was younger and worked as a cashier at a grocer, I had a pension given to me by the employer. As a cashier! Now, that same job at the same exact store does not offer a pension. The employer/employee relationship has changed dramatically over the past 20 years (or more).
If you're a young man in your prime without rich parents and you slacked or lack the ability to compete in the job market, unless you are very charismatic, you won't make a particularly interesting partner.
20 years ago your dating pool was far more limited to location and social circles you were in. Online dating has decimated that. The illusion that you are a big win away from achieving a fast track to status is the allure.
Some of that is just social conditioning though, or maybe an innate instinct but an irrational one in today's day and age. There's no reason a woman can't be the primary breadwinner, and most high earning women I know are very open to dating someone with a much lower salary as long as they are a good partner. But more often than not the guy has a hang up about the situation or is otherwise unwilling to contribute enough around the house. So instead you end up with dual high income paying for cleaning service, daycare, etc.
the average woman simply does not respect men who make less money than them. you can come back with all sorts of anecdotes and every women claiming that isnt the case, but the data on this is very clear.
its my opinion that you simply cannot trust people's words when it comes to hypothetical partners. Peoples stated preferences and actual actions are completely divergent.
I'm not saying data doesn't exist, but this kind of thing makes me laugh i suppose because its just dating. All my friends have no trouble getting girlfriends and as we are recent college graduate age, most do not have salaried jobs and if they do are not the highest paying jobs. In this 22-25 age range though I do notice most of these women are self sufficient usually employed in the service industry or entry level degree related position.
But overall dating is not something i care to even acknolwedge statistics about. Never going to find a partner if you're not living a fulfilling life and have unrealistic standards.
This is well established: Generally, women will pursue men with higher socioeconomic status, men do not make a distinction and optimize for sexual attraction.
Yeah when I read all these comments about how hard dating is for men now, how impossible it is and think about the professional women I know and their dating experiences....
They have very reasonable standards in how they expect men to treat them, and the men they date are overwhelmingly not willing to rise to those standards. These standards are maybe much higher than they would have been even a generation ago but for the most part they are still very reasonable! And I am not even talking about money here.
This is implicitly assuming men's expectations are valid and correct, but not women's.
The standards I'm talking about here are things like "will not mock or belittle me" and "will consider me an equal participant in the relationship and value my desires accordingly."
They haven't misunderstood the situation or made a mistake. Their BATNA is to not have a spouse and they are taking it. Where a generation or two they might have settled for someone who treated them dismissively, but not abusively.
>The standards I'm talking about here are things like "will not mock or belittle me" and "will consider me an equal participant in the relationship and value my desires accordingly."
What you're describing there is a woman's expectation of a man.
A man's expectations of a woman have nothing to do with the above.
>Their BATNA is to not have a spouse and they are taking it.
Interesting claim, let's revisit it when they are in their 50s.
> A man's expectations of a woman have nothing to do with the above.
Wut?
/u/giraffe_lady pretty much stated a baseline minimum for what you should expect from a partner. Are you honestly stating that you believe (most) men don't expect that from women? Because I certainly do and I have ended relationships with women because I didn't get that baseline standard of treatment.
I'm in my 60s so most of my close acquaintances are in their 40s, 50s and 60s as well actually! The lifelong unmarried women have some what-if type feelings re: children of course but not the misery you're hoping for.
None of the rest regret leaving their shitty husbands, or are willing to accept another weak marriage.
I think both genders' standards have drastically increased, at least since the last time I was dating decades ago. And both genders are now more willing to take the BATNA and not compromise. Society is helping by being more accepting of single people making their own way. It's not an easy life though, for either gender, but we are probably mostly better off.
I disagree completely. Simply because you can't find someone who lives up to your expectations does not mean that they are unrealistic. Yes, they might be, but for most reasonable people, it's more likely that they're looking in the wrong place or at the wrong time.
Your assertion is basically "lower your standards to what you see around you."
The problem isn't that women have too high standards for how men treat them. Those standards aren't high enough. The problem is women's standards for everything else are too high: looks, height, money, etc. And women are lowering their other standards for those men.
Women tend to want the single best man they can find. Many men seem to enjoy pursing as many women as they can get and are willing to have casual relationships with women that are less attractive and who they would never commit to. Combine that with online dating where women get to choose from a huge number of men. All the women are pursuing the few most attractive men. Those men have lots of options. Many women are sharing the same top men.
Anecdote: as a bisexual guy (now married to a woman), dating women was much, much harder than dating men. This extends beyond sexual encounters to actual relationships: for every relationship opportunity with a woman, I'd guesstimate I had five opportunities with men. And I essentially never had the opportunity to date a woman with over half my income (at least until I met my wife), while I regularly dated men making substantially more than me.
I think the mismatch is largely due to implicit standards on the part of women (must be a certain race, must be at least average height, must be gender conventional) that are so ubiquitous that they don't even consider them standards.
the average woman simply does not respect men who make less money than them. you can come back with all sorts of anecdotes and every women claiming that isnt the case, but the data on this is very clear.
You are implying more men are left single, unable to afford a house, because they can't find a partner, because the pool of available women isn't available in them?
It's a surprise to our leadership class who has absolutely zero idea what it's like to be a middle class high school / college graduate without premium skills and almost no savings in the 2024 global economy.
