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

DH's cousin and her boyfriend spent about £25,000 on a ring.

They didn't divorce, but only because they didn't even make it up the aisle in the first place. They got engaged, but he had absolutely no notion of getting married. After a couple of years of this she finally had enough and broke it off. He didn't seem to care. About a year later she met someone else. The minute her ex heard he was sniffing around again. It was a case of "I don't want you, but I don't want anyone else to have you either". She told him where to go and is very happy with the other guy. They recently had a baby together.

From the conclusion of the paper:

"We found that marriage duration is either not associated or inversely asso- ciated with spending on the engagement ring and wedding ceremony. Overall, our findings pro- vide little evidence to support the validity of the wedding industry’s message connecting expen- sive weddings with positive marital outcomes."

So...either spending more either has no impact or a negative impact on how long a marriage will last. Well.

I suppose that if one began with the belief that spending more would effectively buy one a better marriage and is therefore gobsmacked to discover that money can't buy love, as it were then this would be a bolt from the blue. Otherwise it's kind of a nothing concussion.

But beyond that, the whole premise is shaky.

What is "a lot" to some earners is a rounding error to others; would have been a more interesting paper if they'd measured what was spent as a proportion of overall assets rather than spending per se.

Bomb No one has said that you can't spend a lot on a wedding and be happily married for many years.
BUT we have all come across mainly brides for whom the groom almost seems an optional extra to the wedding day. If your focus is the wedding and not the marriage, that will never bode well.

Can you not have true love AND an expensive ring?

I think the expensive ring might often have something to do with wealth of the individuals.

It does make sense, but I suppose it depends on the reason for the cost of the ring as well.
If the couple are higher income and the ring is proportional to their finances, or if it's a family heirloom etc then I'd guess the cost of the ring wouldn't make much difference.

However if the couple buy expensive rings that stretch them financially I can see how it would have the potential to correlate with a shorter marriage - either because they get into debt (not a great start to married life!) or because it's indicative of priorities in the wrong place. I'd imagine a lot of it's to do with coincidence as well - the bride zillas, show-off grooms and shallow couples are more likely to have a marriage fail sooner, and they happen to fall in th group which spend a lot of money on rings. Rather than spending more on rings being some kind of cause.

Including the ring and honeymoon we spent £27,000 on our wedding. Next week it's our tenth anniversary.

Oh good. That means my mate who spent £9k on her engagement ring, £20k on his wedding and £15k on his honeymoon will soon enough be rid of his horrible money grabbing, lazy arse crank of a wife.

I can't wait ☺

@busybarbara - yes and I should have realised at the time this was an indicator he’d be an awful spouse (and father) but I was much younger and a lot less wise back then!

Thankfully my now fiancé is someone I admire entirely - he’s the best person I know