Neo-Darwinian Enlightenment Blog and Forum

Money Can Buy You Love

Consistent with the interactive dynamics described above, those in the mating marketplace will also seek association with those of highest status they can, based on their own status as perceived by others. However, here the process is inherently specialized, as females bring something to the table that males cannot possibly possess and cannot live without: eggs, and therefore the vehicle of genetic lineage. Hence, it is the goal of the male to find the female(s) that can provide his offspring with the best quality of genes and mothering possible.

Meanwhile, having a monopoly on the eggs the males need to perpetuate their lines—i.e. to avoid extinction—females are able to trade access to their eggs for access to the resources that are necessary to maximize the chances of survival and successful reproduction, in accord with the survival dynamics described in above.

In this case, the matching up of status rank goes by the specific name of “assortative mating,” as male and female birds of a feather flock together. As females are best served in their genetic proliferation efforts by being able to dedicate themselves fully to producing numerous high-quality offspring with all the benefits of abundant resources, they are attracted to the males that can provide them.

“Stereotypes” By Evolutionary Mandate

In turn, as high-status males have all the resources they need, they assign high female status far more on females’ apparent potential as successful reproducers than successful competitors for resources. The females status markers surrounding beauty and social talents (both with regard to children and other adults) have proven critical to successful reproduction for males (See the Living With Evolution post, “Beauty and Brains: The Unfairness Of It All,” January 27, 2011). Thus, one of the best ways to predict the wealth/status of a female’s mate is to assess her beauty, and one of the best ways to predict the beauty of a male’s mate is to assess his wealth.

Yet is it also worth noting that, as modern females do not have to produce as many offspring as females once did, as many threats have been reduced in high-status nations, and as females have been able to subcontract certain child-rearing duties, say with regard to education, they have increasingly become wealth acquirers in their own right. However, even with the somewhat reduced demands of successful reproduction, those females that let males do the heavy lifting with regard to resources acquisition will have more-success lines. This explains why no matter how much a female is able to make within the marketplace, she will tend to be attracted to males that make more.). Thus, one of the best ways to predict the wealth/status of a female’s mate is to assess her beauty, and one of the best ways to predict the beauty of a male’s mate is to assess his wealth.

So with beautiful females attracting both a higher quantity and higher quality of male suitors/potential male reproductive cooperators, they will be able to gain the services of a wealthier male and therefore greater reproductive success on average. And in reverse, wealthy, high-status males will attract both a higher quantity and higher quality of interested females, which in turn will lead to greater reproductive success on average. Thus, money can buy you love with regard to human male mating pursuits, as females are far better off, and for more likely to, fall in love with wealthy men than poor men.

Overall Competitiveness Enhancer

While not a matter of threat per se, those who have more money will tend to have better access to all resources and technologies that allow for increased competitiveness within the marketplace–i.e., among fellow citizens at all levels of societal organization.

That is, at the individual level, those who have greater wealth will not only have better raw competitive performance than others in all the ways described above; they will have greater cooperative performance than others based on the higher status and negotiating leverage that comes with greater wealth.

That is, others tend to feel strongly compelled to associate and interact with those who have wealth, both because they have more they may share and, more importantly, because: to possess wealth strongly suggests one possesses the attributes necessary to make more of it, which means others may gain access to acquiring more wealth as part of future cooperative pursuits.

So overall, this means that those with wealth, and the high status associated with it, will get to pick and choose from a larger pool of potential cooperators, thereby gaining access to a higher quality of associations. Of course, as all of higher status will use this same sorting process in their “networking” pursuits, higher-status individuals will tend select each other, as each will be able to maximize their cooperative yields. This explains why “Birds of a feather flock together,” as those of similar status will match up in mutually beneficial cooperative fashion.

Needless to say, at the other end of the spectrum, as those of lower status will have relatively few individuals interested in interacting and associating with them, as they have little to offer in any regard, they will be limited to mainly a low quantity and low quality of interactive choices. So similarly low-status birds will tend to flock together. And the same will be true for the majority in the heart of the status bell curve, where those of middling status will also tend to find association with those of like kind.