It’s summer so one of my usual dog-walking companions sometimes brings one of her three children along. On a recent day it was the 15-year-old daughter, a girl who has been carefully sheltered within a two-parent home or at a private school. The topic of her future career came up. The girl volunteered “Everyone knows that if you want to make money you marry and divorce a rich guy. That’s why my parents sent me to a school full of rich boys with low self-esteem. All that they need is an understanding wife. Then, oops, divorce after six months.” From whom had she learned this? “A bunch of the moms at our school made their money this way,” she responded. “[friend’s name]’s mom did it three times. And [other friend’s name]’s mom made money by having a baby without being married.”
After a little more conversation, we established that she overestimated the likely profit from a very short-term marriage and underestimated the profits from having children out of wedlock (Massachusetts offers unlimited child support revenue following a one-night encounter with a high-income resident or visitor). This was consistent with the survey of adults that we did in Harvard Square.
The inter-generational aspects are kind of interesting. The teenager’s mom is a fully trained attorney. The dad is an MBA who works in the financial services industry. They entered the workforce before the 1990s child support guidelines made it straightforward to calculate the potential profits from having children. The daughter is intelligent and healthy and will be the repository of more than $500,000 in education (K-12 plus college). Yet she recognizes that, compared to working with her college degree at a W-2 job, under today’s U.S. family law system, she can expect to earn far more cash through a thoughtful use of her body and her children.
I think the girl is the one with the low self-esteem.
I think the major problem with this still is that there are still simply not enough truly rich/high income males for all attractive females to take advantage of this situation. The vast majority of them are going to end up doing this to a guy whose career tops out as the manager of an Auntie Anne’s location rather than tops out as a respected surgeon. What should be done for all the females who miss this boat? Don’t they deserve to be on it too?
I’ve never heard anybody talk like this, adult or particularly child. Many of your posts complain about the general idiocy of the people around you. It makes me wonder why you choose to live where you do.
F.R.E.D.
yes they do talk like this. Even recent immigrants (female) to this country are aware of all of the goodies they can access. “It’s out there, why shouldn’t I have it.”.
Phil, I’ve become somewhat inured to the idea that this is the world we (and fifteen year old girls) live in, but it always astonishes me that you find a way to have the same conversation wherever you go.
And honestly, your town sounds like something out of Dante. With debatably-better schools. The mortal plane isn’t quite so dire.
Phil,
I’ve read your blog for awhile now and feel that I must comment. (Don’t know if you or the mods will see fit to put this on your site).
Clearly, some woman has dealt you a very, very bad hand. I hope somehow you can let this go and enjoy the rest of your days. There is way too much to observe in this world than to devote many of your living, breathing moments to what a bad woman in the USA can do to some poor, unsuspecting rich guy.
You are a respected entrepreneur and educator, so please humor us with astute posts on something other than real world divorce. You are either trying to bring satire humor to this upsetting subject or you are borderline obsessed. Either way, please talk about something else.
I’m an interracially married housewife to more than two children. We don’t even show up in divorce statistics, and we have more children per union than average. I still love Phil’s posts on these matters because if I were white, I would indeed have gotten more income out of being a housewife twice (once to a guy I divorced after a child or two and again after marrying a second guy while still collecting from the first). And I think it’s important to put that out there, that this is a way some women might go. Then men can select women who will choose otherwise. And women can choose men who they won’t wish to divorce or collect cash from in out of wedlock scenarios.
Who are these dudes taking sloppy seconds? I don’t get it. If the other guy is dead, well maybe. But the chick has kids and there’s a father still floating around in the picture? I really don’t get it.
Phil – are you encouraging your daughter to embark upon this career path?
Mortimer: Friend me on Facebook if you want to see my sentimental posts of gratitude to the women who take care of me in our multi-generational household, complete with pictures of the kids with the Golden Retriever, etc. That side of my personality fits in well with Facebook, but this blog is about economics (when it is not about tech, photography, and travel). So I try to refrain from Hallmark-style posts.
[Separately, your summary of family law as a way for women to get something from men is obsolete. Nearly all of the attorneys whom we interviewed for http://www.realworlddivorce.com/ had helped men get paid very well for trading in an older hard-working wife for a new young companion. Our social circle here in Massachusetts includes a working woman in her 50s who had to pay her stay-at-home husband (he gave up his career in favor of pursuing hobbies once it became clear how successful the wife was going to be) about $25 million so that he could pursue his passion of having sex with women in their 20s from Craigslist.
Men can also work as out-of-wedlock child support profiteers in some U.S. states. See http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2016/01/07/bristol-palin-being-sued-for-child-support-by-ex-fiancee-and-medal-of-honor-winner/ for a celebrity example. Your focus on “rich” is also misplaced. A brief sexual encounter with a generic high-income person, such as a dentist, will be more lucrative than either college+work or a long-term marriage to a middle-income person. Finally, family law plaintiffs can take stuff away from defendants but at the end of the day they most take stuff away from their own children (the college fund turned into legal fees, for example).]
The girl’s rich male classmates must know all this as well. Seems like fair game to me. Men must treat this as a cost to procreate. Biology vs economics.
Phil,
Get help.
Phil,
Thank you for your thoughts. This is the world we live in. In the course of my work day, I hear from women in all walks of life, tell me exactly what you write down. Keep at it and don’t let the naysayers clip your wings.
There is nothing unusual or aberrant about what happened to you in Family Court. There is systemic corruption that induces lesser earning spouses to morph into an unrecognizable evil, greedy and amoral ex.. You are lucky enough to be able to understand and blog about it and have a life afterwards. You can bring transparency and fight the good fight where others have tried but couldn’t. So many others were drawn into the vortex and downward spiral of lifetime enslavement, loss of family, home and job, and long prison terms for unpayable debt. Keep it up for the silent sufferers.
Older woman explaining to her daughter the benefits of having a baby with a rich older man:
OK, he’s a bit wrinkly – but who wouldn’t want a Jagger Baby and a juicy pension?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3693981/RACHEL-JOHNSON-OK-s-bit-wrinkly-wouldn-t-want-Jagger-Baby-juicy-pension.html
“But still, I had to explain why I don’t share her revulsion and I do get why Sir Mick has knocked up his loved-up girlfriend. You won’t hear any limp jokes about how Miss Hamrick could soon be changing two sets of nappies from me.”
“The lucky lady won’t just be having any old baby with some wrinkly she hooked up with a couple of years ago. She’ll be having a Jagger Baby with a capital J.”
“Never, ever, underestimate the power of the brand when it comes to the female’s procreative choices. Never, ever underestimate the power of financial security when it comes to our selection of a mate.
Miss Hamrick is having a Jagger Baby and has sorted out her pension at the same time.”
GermanL, do not forget that that Jagger Baby has female siblings who will not be able to resist the magnetic attraction that a newborn—and then a blood relative!—exerts on a(ny) woman. So first they’ll bond, and then become its additional and substitute also-mothers. Given the power of Celebrity, that baby may even end up on the cover of the “Hello! Magazine before it knows how to spel magzin (and, should she be biracial, forget my conditional clause—she’s a given photo op/prop in numerous spreads all over Western Hemisphere).
Lastly, the Jagger GF needs not worry about having to change her BF’s nappies… I’m sure he’s already arranged for a suitable, well-remunerated, Finally Can Get Satisfaction-guaranteed caretaker service along the lines of Prince Akeem’s underwater clean-scrubbing practices.
Guess not.