Take a Spending Test Before You Marry: Tightwads and Spendthrifts Attract Each Other, and Divorce More
Research sorts spenders into tightwads and spendthrifts. The two extremes attract each other, but after marriage they fight more about money and report lower marital satisfaction; and the more a wedding costs, the higher the divorce risk.
The argument · tap a timestamp to hear it
Being a tightwad isn't frugality, it's that spending hurts
Scott Rick and coauthors proposed in 2008 a spending scale running from tightwad to spendthrift. The core isn't how much you spend but "anticipatory pain" — the emotional reaction you feel at the moment of paying. Tightwads feel too much pain from spending and spend less than they ideally would; spendthrifts feel too little and spend more than they ideally would. The scale measures the gap between your "ideal self" and your actual behavior, so a very wealthy person can be a tightwad and someone near bankruptcy can be a spendthrift. On the show, Ben retook the test and scored 11, just past the tightwad line; Dan scored 16, an unconflicted consumer.
— Benjamin FelixTightwads and spendthrifts are precisely who attract each other
Research shows tightwads are more likely to marry spendthrifts than another tightwad. The authors' explanation: people are poor at introspection about what will attract them in a real partner, and when someone else displays the same flaw you have, it reminds you of that negative trait. Hence "fatal fiscal attractions" — the other person lacks your spending vice, so at first they seem especially attractive. But the excitement is temporary. Afterward, tightwad-spendthrift couples have more frequent money conflicts and lower marital happiness; the wider the gap between the two on the scale, the more pronounced the conflict, and this holds even controlling for household debt and savings.
— Benjamin FelixEveryone already has a default prenup
In Ontario it's called a marriage contract; elsewhere, a prenup. The key premise: when you marry, you already have a default agreement under your jurisdiction's family law, so the first step is to find out what the default terms are, then decide whether to write your own. Not marrying can also have legal consequences — cohabiting, or having children without marrying, can still carry legal implications on separation. Why do so few use one? First, optimism bias: engaged couples can accurately estimate the national divorce rate but estimate their own divorce probability far lower, so the agreement they sign doesn't seriously contemplate the scenario it's meant to govern. Second, signaling cost: proposing a prenup is itself read as a negative signal of "lack of commitment to the relationship," which makes the other party less willing to raise it.
— Benjamin FelixThe more a wedding costs, the higher the divorce risk
A 2021 paper in the Journal of Consumer Policy surveyed more than 3,000 married people and, after controlling for income, demographics and relationship factors, found the opposite of intuition: the more a man spent on an engagement ring, the higher the divorce risk; the more a woman spent on the wedding, the higher the divorce risk. Wedding-related debt stress may be one mechanism. The couples with the lowest divorce rates spent under $1,000 on the wedding. But the same study found two kinds of wedding spending that predicted longer marriages: more guests, and going on a honeymoon — neither related to price. Ben's wedding cost about $300, with only his sister, parents and wife present; Dan's cost about $5,000 for 150 people, saving money with a free photographer, a friend making the cake and gifts.
— Benjamin FelixThe benefits of merging finances may come from thinking, not doing
A 2022 meta-analysis covering six studies and more than 38,000 people found that couples who fully merge finances report higher relationship satisfaction and are less likely to break up, and this holds across cultures. A 2023 Journal of Consumer Research study found joint accounts foster communal norms, shared goals and good feelings about "managing money as a team." But more counterintuitive is a 2025 paper by Johan Yana Pet: merely directing people's attention to an existing joint account rather than to their separate accounts produces similar effects — that is, thinking of finances as "ours" rather than "yours and mine" itself makes people talk about money more, and more effectively, regardless of how the accounts are actually set up. Another 2022 paper found that increases in jointly held wealth raise life satisfaction, while increases in individually held wealth have no significant effect.
— Benjamin FelixFinancial infidelity is a deeper problem than spending disagreements
Financial infidelity is defined as: engaging in a financial behavior you expect your partner would disapprove of, then hiding it. A recent paper found that when one partner is more prone to financial infidelity than the other, couples are more likely to drift toward separate financial goals rather than shared ones, and it predicts lower financial well-being and relationship satisfaction; this holds even after controlling for mismatches like tightwad/spendthrift. Joint accounts can increase transparency, but if someone is deliberately hiding things, even a joint account can be supplemented with a hidden one, and the problem escalates from money to trust. Dan's judgment: if someone is committing financial infidelity, switching to a joint account either forces them to find another way or puts the problem on the table and leads to a split — which is already beyond the scope of financial planning.
— Benjamin FelixIn household asset allocation, the husband's preferences are systematically amplified
A 2026 Review of Financial Studies paper found that Australian households, in household-level asset allocation, on average incorporate 60% of the husband's risk tolerance and only 40% of the wife's, which the authors call a 20-percentage-point bargaining-power gap; half of it comes from observable characteristics like income and employment, and the other half is attributed to a gender effect. The husband's average bargaining power is 69% in Germany and 61% in the US; the three countries are statistically indistinguishable, but all exceed 60%. A 2021 Journal of Finance paper found that US households where the husband has high financial literacy are more likely to participate in the stock market than households where the wife has equal financial literacy, which the authors say is best explained by gender identity norms rather than ability differences; the mechanism the randomized experiments point to: female identity suppresses a wife's willingness to voice her ideas, and male identity makes a husband less responsive to his spouse's input.
— Benjamin FelixOvertrading costs men nearly a percentage point a year
Barber and Odean's 2001 study of 35,000 brokerage accounts found men traded 45% more frequently than women, consistent with the prediction that overconfidence leads to harmful overtrading. Trading has costs: overtrading reduced men's net returns by 2.65 percentage points a year and women's by 1.72 percentage points. Both groups hurt themselves by trading too much; women just did less of it. Dan adds that among the client couples he works with, the primary contact is almost evenly split between men and women; but when the man is the primary contact, the conversation is more about the portfolio, and when the woman is, it's more about planning. He also observes that some male clients ask questions they "feel they should ask," more like performance, while female clients almost never do.
— Benjamin FelixIn their own words · checked verbatim
Like a tight wad is not someone who uh just doesn't get a lot of pleasure from spending. It's someone who deep down wishes they could get more pleasure from spending than they're actually getting.
Benjamin Felix0:03
the result is what the authors describe as fatal fiscal attractions where someone who doesn't share your same shortcomings from a spending perspective is initially exciting and appealing to you for that reason.
Benjamin Felix23:15
the act of requesting a primup prenup functions as a negative signal showing a lack of commitment to the prospective relationship which makes it less likely for a partner to ask for one in the first place.
Benjamin Felix30:17
couples who who experienced the lowest divorce rates spent less than $1,000 on their wedding, which is just fascinating.
Benjamin Felix41:25
increases in jointly held wealth led to greater life satisfaction whereas gains in individually held wealth did not have any significant impact.
Benjamin Felix48:30
trading reduced men's net returns by 2.65 percentage points per year versus 1.72 percentage points for women. To be clear, both groups hurt themselves by trading too much. Women just did less of it.
Benjamin Felix1:00:41
the couples who are going to set themselves up the best financially and emotionally are the ones who approach finances of marriage, the finances of marriage as a as a team and have open communication.
Benjamin Felix1:08:45
Figures
| Tightwad cutoff on the tightwad/spendthrift scale | 11 points or below is a tightwad | 10:09 |
| Ben's score on the retaken spending scale | 11, just past the tightwad line | 10:09 |
| Dan's score on the retaken spending scale | 16, unconflicted consumer | 10:09 |
| Sample size of the wedding-spending-and-divorce study | More than 3,000 married respondents | 40:23 |
| Wedding spending of the couples with the lowest divorce rates | Under $1,000 | 41:25 |
| Scale of the merged-finances meta-analysis | Six studies, more than 38,000 participants | 46:29 |
| Share of the husband's risk tolerance incorporated in Australian household asset allocation | 60% | 57:36 |
| Husband's average bargaining power | Germany 69%, US 61% | 57:36 |
| Men's trading frequency relative to women's | 45% higher | 1:00:41 |
| Drag on net returns from overtrading | Men 2.65 percentage points a year, women 1.72 percentage points | 1:00:41 |
Glossary
- tightwad
- Someone who feels too much pain from spending and spends less than they ideally would — not the same as being frugal.
- spendthrift
- Someone who feels too little pain from spending and spends more than they ideally would.
- unconflicted consumer
- The middle of the spending scale, where actual spending roughly matches ideal spending.
- financial infidelity
- Engaging in a financial behavior you expect your partner would disapprove of and deliberately hiding it.
- prenup
- Called a marriage contract in Ontario; used to override the default terms of your jurisdiction's family law.
How to listen
Founders and investors who are married or about to be, especially anyone negotiating a prenup, merging accounts or planning a wedding; also readers who want to understand how gender norms distort household financial decision power.
The first 15 minutes on the spending scale and the last 10 minutes of listener comments and PWL team-building chatter can be skipped.