How don't I love thee?

[archerships]

http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/04/09/how-dont-i-love-thee/#more-61

April 9, 2007, 11:06 pm
How Don’t I Love Thee?
By John Tierney

"Suppose you’re an ordinary-looking guy whose online picture is ranked around the median in attractiveness. (In the study, the ratings of attractiveness were done by independent male and female observers hired by the researchers.) And suppose you’d like to be as successful with women as a guy whose picture is ranked in the top tenth. Then you’d need to make $143,000 more than him. If your picture is ranked in the bottom tenth, you’d need to make $186,000 more than him.

Similarly, according to the study, a 5-foot-0 guy would need to make $325,000 more than a 6-foot-0 man to be as successful in the online dating market. A 5-foot-4 man would need $229,000; a 5-foot-6 man would need $183,000; a 5-foot-10 man would need $32,000. And if that 6-foot-0 man wanted to do as well as a 6-foot-4 man, he’d need to make $43,000 more.

For women in the online study, shorter is better. A 5-foot-6 women would need to make $59,000 more than a 5-foot-0 or 5-foot-2 woman to do as well. She’d need to make $50,000 more than a 5-foot-4 woman."

I wonder what the age premium is? How much does a 35 year old need to make to best a 25 year old?

Comments

The age premium

[resipisco.livejournal.com]

In my experience, only 10k more.

[chutzpahgirl.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't the age premium depend on the difference between the couple's ages? Or if there were minor children involved?

[frauhedgehog.livejournal.com]

A study obviously researched for its potential as media sensationalism. Rich, good-looking assholes are a dime a dozen.
I think the age premium thing would be a bigger factor with women in regard to fertility. My hypothesis, however, is that people's true dating preferences are too idiosyncratic for such a blunt measure.

[selfishgene.livejournal.com]

My sense is that people are only idiosyncratic within a narrow range of mate eligibility. This kind of study reveals how a range of eligibility is determined. Once that range is established, then people will look for more quirky requirements.

[fishsupreme]

I would imagine that the age premium differs wildly by gender. As a general rule, men want women to be young and beautiful, while women want men to be rich and powerful. Note that "young" wasn't on the women's top-2 list. To many women (i.e. those over 22 themselves), a 35-year-old is not significantly less desirable than a 25-year-old (though a 55-year-old is.) However, the same can't be said for nearly as many men.

I am, however, surprised that the "monetary equivalents" were so much larger on the men than the women (i.e. 2 inches shorter is worth $9,000 on a woman while 2 inches taller is worth $47,000 on a man), because of what it says about how much money is worth to partners. A lot of men don't care how much money their prospective mates make at all, and a substantial fraction prefer their mates to make significantly less than them. Thus, I would expect it to take a profound amount of money to even out even a small difference in attractiveness. I'm also surprised that shortness commands a premium in women, what with the "model type" generally being tall and thin (I would expect a penalty for the very tall -- 5'10" and above -- simply because most men don't want to date a woman taller than themselves, thus limiting the dating pool for very tall women.)

Actually... who knows, maybe they're misinterpreting the results and men are willing to put up with a higher income by women in order to get a taller one...

[kittles.livejournal.com]

The only issue I have with dating a man 7 years older than me is that I worry we won't have as much time together in our old age as I would like.