do you earn enough to compensate for your shortcomings?
 

Nothing remotely important, just more fodder to stir debate. Let's hear how inaccurate you think this column is because you are an exception and therefore disprove the data.

http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/...-thee/#more-61

Of particular interest:

All relationships are based on trade offs. For everything that you find annoying or just plain unattractive about your eventual mate, there are other things that you feel are just perfect. I suppose some people might think financial compensation is a plus, but I'd argue that most relationships founded on this premis are doomed to failure because if there's one thing we surely must all acknowledge it's that money doesn't buy happiness or love or anything else like that.

Remember, the data is from a dating site. Not a 'successful relationships' site. Short term you might overlook a few glaring flaws for the sake of living it up, but I'd guess most women or men wouldn't be satisfied with this sort of trade off in the long run.

The article is just idiotic. Every relationship is different, but if you are basing yours on money (not how ambitious or lazy someone is, or is not) you are not in a relationship, you are in a partnership and I pity you.

It's idiotic because they studied... "more than 10,000 American customers of HurryDate — a company that gathers a couple of dozen people at a time for a round robin of three-minute speed dates"

Self-selected people who:
- Feel they can determine suitability in three minutes.
- Are more concerned with looks
- Who feel they can, in three mins, win on looks or overcome winning on looks
- Who feel they can assess a possible partner in three mins
- Who are willing to put their income up front

Such obvious selection bias means this tripe is not really suitable for the Times and belongs in Cosmo or Maxim instead.

Damn, I can't even which cupcake I might want in less than three minutes. That one has a bit more frosting, but it's a bit smaller, but..., but..., but...

Eat both. :yum: :drool:

If you called up Mrs. Dallas right now and asked her how much money I make, I expect she'd not be able to tell you. This is not because I'm keeping secrets from her, but simply because the subject doesn't often come up in household conversation.

The fact that these people are, apparently, discerning income levels in less than three minutes tells you what you need to know about the process.

That's hysterical. Just yesterday, my husband called me to ask how much he makes (to put on some mortgage-related form.) I do all our finances and he honestly had no idea.

I don't know how much I make, but I could find out easily enough without calling my wife.

But would she know if you asked?

Probably not, but she knows what my paycheck is and comments on whether I did lots of overtime or none at all that pay period. You know, the stuff that matters on a day to day basis.

Now's about the time of year that you should have that number readily available.

how in the hell do you not know how much you make? unbelievable.

but then, i get calls from people all the time that want to know who financed their car. when i ask where they send their payment....oh, uh...i dunno, my wife/husband handles that.

i bet they know what's on channel 6 at 9 pm on wednedsday, tho.

well, this is not really news to me. I heard somewhere, and I think it's true from my own observation, that people tend to pair up with others of approximately the same attractiveness level.

Unless large amounts of money are involved, then all bets are off.

i.e., Anna Nichole Smith and Mr. Marshall

When I worked in the computer lab in college, I'd get people who'd come in to print a file who didn't know if they'd done it on a Mac or a PC. (That may not sound to dumb to youngsters thinking of OS X vs. WinXP, but this was 1987 and the differences were much more pronounced to the casual eye.)

A few times a year you make financial decisions with all the facts in front of you, and then you follow that course and forget about it until the next time.