Surprised to learn that that the more a couple spends on their wedding and engagement rings, the more likely they are to divorce

[crunchymint]

This is taken from this piece of research and it does surprise me.

www.csus.edu/faculty/m/fred.molitor/docs/wedding%20expenses%20and%20marriage%20duration1.pdf

It's a 3yo American article? would the same cultural effect be felt this side of the Atlantic?

I'm not surprised. A very expensive ring is purchased when the man thinks that the woman won't tolerate anything less, and if one partner loves conditionally on the size of a gift they haven't got the right personality or values to deal with a long marriage. Someone who is truly in love would wear a ring pull as a ring if they had to.

I don't know NewYear. I have no idea why how much you spend on a ring would correlate with how long a marriae is likely to last.

Wouldn’t particularly surprise me. Some of the happiest couples I know, just wanted to get married and the wedding was just a day. I’m spending a bit on ours, close to £15,000. But most of that is venue and food.

I didn’t want a wedding, I wanted the town hall followed by a pub lunch but my OH really wanted a bigger celebration so I went with it.

I’d agree with that. Every one of my friendship group, except one couple, is now divorced. That’s nine couples, seven divorces. The divorced ones all had traditional 10k plus weddings plus extravagant rings. The still marrieds eloped.

Doesn't surprise me. All a question of priorities I guess. We spent to money on a deposit for the house rather than a party but I know plenty of people who've focused on the day rather than the life together after.

I have seen brides for who, the wedding seems more important than the actual groom. Not surprised that these marriages don't last.

I think it's surprising mainly because money troubles are a big source of marital discord and the more expensive your wedding is, the more money you likely have! But maybe it works the other way and expensive weddings tend to indicate debt / poor financial planning? Who knows.

I think it's silly to try and extrapolate general statements about how big weddings must mean selfish and shallow couples. That's inevitably going to be true of some people, but (half of!) marriages fail for a variety of reasons.

I wholeheartedly agree with it. All the High maintenance princess tippy toes brides, who I know through work all got binned off. The lovely lady who got married an had the wedding breakfast as a bbq on the beach, it going on married 25 years

I don’t really get it tbh. My engagement ring was £3k 18 years ago, it’s recently been valued and would cost around £10k to buy now. It’s not really something you can judge is it? The price of precious metals change all the time, so it’s not really a reflection of much.

People who buy £30 rings tend to not have any money, not be more in love

There were lots of double negatives there lol

Sprinkle That is what I have assumed, but not according to this research.

Maybe they can afford to split up? Divorce is an expensive business - lots of people seem to stay together for financial reasons.

I imagine that one of the factors is that perhaps the couple over extend themselves financially to pay for the ring and wedding and then start married life with the strain of large debt.

Maybe they’re too poor to divorce. Money brings choices in life after all

Doesn’t ring true in my experience. My friends and family whose marriages have failed are all across the spectrum of how much they spent on their weddings/rings, from a budget elopement to Gretna Green to all the bells and whistles. I’m pretty sceptical of these kind of statistics.

I think if you are talking about a bridezilla throwing a purely show-off wedding, when most of the money is spent on the photographer and guests are slowly getting drunk bored out of their mind for 3 or 4 hours whilst the photos are taken, then it makes sense.

if it's just about the amount you spend, it's ridiculous. Some people have cash,the bride treats herself to her dream dress, the guests are having a lovely party (instead of the pretentious and cheap paid bars!), and the couple goes on an expensive luxurious honeymoon.. why would that have any impact on the length of the wedding.

Our wedding cost more than average, but more because it was relatively large (136 guests) than because it was very showy. Also it was in London (as I grew up there) which I imagine adds to the expense. Still together and happy 15 years later

Oooh good! I insisted on moissanite for both my engagement and wedding rings. Did not want diamonds. Cost less than £500 for both. Still happily married

Sweet! Ours were a gift, so didn't cost is any thing! We've been married 20 years as of this September....

The article actually suggests a much more complex relationship than that, doesn't it? It says:

In bivariate regressions, having no engagement
ring and having wedding expenses below $1,000
are each associated with increases in the hazard
of divorce, while spending $8,000 or more on an
engagement ring is associated with a decrease
in the hazard of divorce. This appears to be consistent
with the relationship between wedding
expenses and marriage duration posited by wedding
industry advertising. However, the picture
changes in multivariate regressions. Spending
between $2,000 and $4,000 on an engagement
ring is significantly associated with an increase
in the hazard of divorce among the sample of
men. Specifically, in the sample of men, spending
between $2,000 and $4,000 on an engagement
ring is associated with a 1.3 times greater hazard
of divorce as compared with spending between
$500 and $2,000

It says that having no ring at all gives you an increased risk of divorce, but $2,000 to $4,000 is a higher risk than a cheaper ring - but, if you look at their actual figures, $4000 to $8000 is lower risk than both $2000 to $4000, and $0 to $500.

I know people love this simplistic 'if you spend money on a ring/wedding it means it's not about the marriage for you and you'll get divorced!' narrative (I will put money on this thread attracting a load of smug 'will, we got married for £1.62 and we've been married for 97 years' posts), but their actual findings were a lot more complicated than that - and, it's worth pointing out, barely any of them were statistically significant (for the ring figures only the increased risk at $2000 to $4000 is marked as significant).

It bodes well for my marriage though as like ethel my ring is moissanite and the wedding was £2000

Excellent post Margaret

Ah yes, we've already got some 'my ring cost nothing/next to nothing so my marriage is bound to last!' posts. Bad luck guys, you're in the second most risky group!

It is what I would expect really as often those that spend the most for the biggest show are more about the wedding than the actual marriage. Also unless you are really loaded, that money would be better spent on setting yourselves up with house and furniture etc which will no doubt help you have a less stressful life together.