Modern Day Love: Should Men Pay on a Date?
According to the study, 84% of men said they paid for most dating expenses, showing that traditional gender roles are alive and well in the 21st century. Strangely, in the same survey, only 58% of women said that men paid for most bills, indicating a large gap in perception about who is paying for what.
However, despite their apparent outward generosity, 64% of men believed the woman should contribute, and 44% said they would stop seeing a woman who never offered to pay her way on a date.
Men expect to pay for the date, but would like the woman to offer a contribution. What could be confusing about that? Except that 76% of men say they would feel guilty accepting the woman’s contribution. So not offering to contribute on the date is a bad move, but forcing a contribution into his hand is also likely to lead to awkwardness.
As if the etiquette surrounding date-funding wasn’t complicated enough, 54% of women offer to pay, but nearly as many would be secretly hoping this offer is turned down and would be put off a man who expected a woman to pay for the date.
If costly first dates are financially crippling you, speak up, otherwise you’ll waste the whole first date silently seething with resentment at the prospect of paying for yet another bill. This is not the right frame of mind for finding love.
Splitting a restaurant bill 50:50 can seem very formal and lead to unsatisfactory comparisons about who drank what and how many courses you each had. Try to find a more relaxed way of dividing expenses. For example, if you go to the cinema, then for dinner, tell your date to book the tickets and in return you’ll buy her dinner.
Alternatively, draw up a list of fun, romantic but inexpensive first dates. Taking someone out to dinner can be saved for the second date, when you are more confident about your compatibility.
Chivalry is an attractive quality in a man, but before you accept yet another free night out, think about it from a man’s perspective. How many dates have you been on? If you had to pay for them all yourself, how much would that have cost you? Is it fair for the men to keep footing the bill for finding love?
When making a financial contribution to the date, you need to be fairly insistent. A half-hearted ‘would you like to split the bill?’ is likely to be met with a ‘no’ which actually means ‘yes, I would love to split the bill, but I can clearly see you expect me to pay for all of it, so no thanks’. Instead, look at the bill, decide how much you want to chip in (50% or whatever you ordered) and put the money on the table. Don’t offer to pay for all of the bill, unless this is a second date and he paid for the first date.
Plan ahead to avoid ending a date on an awkward bill-paying conversation. Agree in advance how the bill we be split, with a casual comment such as ‘you buy the food, and I’ll get the drinks’. It’s better to agree who’s paying for what before you meet, otherwise the question of money will be needling away at both of you for the whole duration of the date.
And be sympathetic to each other’s positions. You probably both feel a little awkward about the bill-splitting, so try not to draw conclusions based on who pays for what.