It seems like my wife spends more money but I think in reality, I am more prone to impulse purchases. She spends money on more day-to-day items. Some of it on things I wouldn’t buy but then again, I buy stuff she’d never consider.

My experience tells me, bottom line, women are better with money than men. Call me a chauvinist.

However, some of the money issue can also boil down to where the societal pressures lie. Women are judged more on appearance in this society. In general how many guys wear makeup or get their hair done by a specific hairstylist? And who does the shopping, if my mom buys my dad’s shirts, that number is still probably attributed to her spending even though the items are for my dad. I suspect some of this may change as gender roles become more fluid.

One man’s $50,000 purchase way outnumbers one woman’s purchase of even a Hermes Grace Kelley $7,000 hand bag + Manolo shoes for $600! Hence, I believe men spend way more than women.

My wife LOVES free stuff and spends next to nothing. I used to spend a lot, but have been influenced by my wife and also spend next to nothing. We enjoy the great outdoors, and hiking/biking are free to oh so cheap!

Anyway, back to the question:

“do you think women or men spend more money?”

My thoughts went along the lines of your post. I remember reading a marketing book about the power of the women’s pocket book or something like that and they said about what Wes Y said, “that women are responsible for over 80% of the consumer dollars spent.” One of the reasons is that women tend to shop for the whole family, too. Also, it seems like guys like to buy big ticket items.

When we are all kids, it really doesn’t matter, but once we get into our teens, then women spend more money for makeup, clothes etc while the guys spend some money trying to get dates with the girls without much money left over for themselves.

As we age and get out of college, men start to spend some more money for themselves because of the increased purchasing power but still, a good percentage spend a sizable chunk of their earnings on trying to date women (paying for movies, dinners and gifts etc).

Then, as we start families and get older, the need for women to spend diminishes as they care more about the family than materialistic things like a hand bag, while men increase their spending as their income (and probably ego) increases.

So in summary, I always thought that women spend more in the earlier years and men spend more as they age.

That’s my subjective opinion based on people I know and it’s a generalization of course. The more important gauge of a person’s spending behavior is how frugal they were brought up to be and not so much the sex orientation. I just thought this subject was entertaining