Money & Masculinity: Scott Galloway & Ed Elson on What Defines a Man

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Today is number 64. That's the percentage of top 100 podcast hosts who are men.
Ed, I've, no joke, received a bunch of messages messages or funny jokes about our podcasts. Some of my favorites.

Podcasts are what happens when someone realizes no one in their actual life wants to hear them talk. So they export the suffering to strangers.
It's so true.

Like no one in my family gives a shit what I think

wants to hear me talk about anything.

And then this is the one I like about property markets. Listening to property markets is

like willingly signing up for financial colonoscopy. Invasive, revealing, and somehow you walk away knowing you need to get your life together.

So I think we have to do a bit of a survey here.

We had some pushback on how profane we are, or how not we, how profane I am.

I'm not in trouble. You're not in trouble.
I'm in trouble. So I want to do,

I would like people to weigh in and say, should we, should we dial it back a notch?

Because, and let me,

and there's no way to do this without sounding defensive. There is a strategy to my vulgarity.

The first is it's authentic. I am truly a profane and vulgar person.

And two,

I want to take vulgarity and profanity back for the left. It used to be, we used to, progressives used used to own it.
Now we're seeing it just fucking humorless.

It used to be Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor, George Carlin, kind of own profanity, and that's one of the things that drew me to being a progressive.

And I think that also, just to be blunt, I want to attract younger people to the podcast and to our work.

But at the same time, I get a lot of emails saying I wanted to circulate this around the company because I think it's interesting, but I can't. That's what I'm worried about.
Yeah.

Well, you're just worried about getting a first Ferrari is what you're saying.

I've got a lot of worries. There you go.

So, anyways, please comment

in the YouTube. I don't know, YouTube channel.
Do we want comments? Okay, well,

we're going to get a million comments from both sides.

There's going to be thousands of comments saying Prof G is hilarious and we love the dick jokes, and thousands of comments saying, I want to give this to my son, and I can't recommend it because it's disgusting and profane.

So, this isn't really going to solve your problem here. I think you need to decide and just take some executive command here and just make the call.

Because you're right, there's a balance that we're trying to take into account. Because I'm just, I'm just prepared.

We can ask this question and let's watch the comments flood in, but you're not going to get the answer that you want because the people are going to be divided. This is the problem with democracy.

It's not very efficient. Well, I should have made the decision this morning when I woke up with a condom hanging out of my ass and a half bottle of jack drink.

Okay, we've just made the decision. Thank you for the confidence, Ed.

decision made

decision

made

uh should you be worried that your partner has sucked hundreds of dicks or is my wife overreacting ed decision confirmed

decision

confirmed

all right let's get there you have it let's get it

pull over i know I know. Why don't we do this? Why don't we take a poll and stick it up your ass?

Again, I think we've come to resolution here.

This has been a productive conversation, Ed.

Did I tell you one most comical in the ninth grade? Same theme? No, I wasn't as dirty back then. I used to be funny.
I used to be funny. Now I'm just like dispirited and like

depraved. Now my humor is just dark.
It used to be actually funny. Back in the day, like that I'm dating myself.
You know, they used to compare you to celebrities.

It was like, the hottest girl is Angie Dickinson. Like they, they compare, you don't even know who that is.
I don't know who that is. Or they'd say Barbara Eden.
Do you know who that is? Nope.

Or Raquel Welch, maybe? Do you know who Raquel Welch is?

Jesus Christ, this is so depressing.

Oh my God.

How about David Hasselhoff? Yes, I know David Hasselhoff. Yes.
Only because he's had a bit of a comeback. Yeah, he has.
And he was a judge on Britain's Got Talent. That's how I know him.

That was my favorite show growing up. Yeah, that was a real high moment for his career.
That's called

My Ex-Wife is Getting the Residuals from Knight Rider, and I gotta do this shit.

He was actually the number one recording artist in Germany for a year. Wow.
He was saying like

he was a rock star for a while.

Anyways, what are we doing today, Ed? What's going on? Well, we've got a special episode today, Scott, as it's Thanksgiving.

You have been in the news a lot lately because you have a new book out, which...

I don't know. I wonder if our audience even knows that you have a book out.
There hasn't been enough.

I don't know if we've gotten the word out enough. Well, you know what? I'm kind of shy when it comes to self-promotion.

If you haven't heard about it, if you haven't been watching CNN or MSNBC or News Nation, or if you haven't been listening to every podcast on the planet, Scott has a book out.

It's called Notes on Being a Man. It's been a big success.
It went number one on Amazon. It made the New York Times bestseller list.

I'm sorry, hold on, hold on, hold on. It didn't make the New York Times bestseller list.
It was the New York Times bestseller.

It was number one on the New york times bestseller list thank you thank you um just yeah we're gonna we're gonna fire someone who wrote my notes incorrectly fact-checking yeah

but but it has also stirred up a lot of controversy online um because of

I mean, this men versus women debate always does, and some people take issue with your vision of masculinity, especially when it comes to money. And that is what we are going to talk about today.

We're going to talk about the relationship between masculinity and money, how they're connected for better or worse.

We're going to discuss some of the criticisms of your vision of masculinity, whether it is too money dependent, whether it is too capitalistic.

And by the end of the conversation, hopefully we'll have an answer to the big question, which is how important is money to being a man?

So, that sounds good, first of all. Do I have your consent?

It sounds awful. I haven't eaten and I didn't read the notes and I find myself like very insecure and defensive.

Well, that's good. That's where the good stuff happens.
Yeah, let's do it.

So we're going to start with a clip.

And this is from your interview with Katie Kuric.

And this clip went viral. Great.
Yes. Is this like when she asked Governor Palin? When she asked Governor Palin what newspaper she read and Governor Palin couldn't name a single newspaper.

You're too young to remember that. No, I do remember that.
I do remember that. My parents are talking about that.

So yeah, we're going to play this clip. It went viral because the question was pretty good, but also your aunt said.

Let's listen. I was looking at a Reddit thread and it was called Scott Galloway Needs to Stop Talking About Men and Boys.

And someone wrote, I'm a therapist and I see a ton of young adult men and boys. Let me tell you, I can spot a Galloway watcher within about five minutes.

Galloway, to his credit, packages his brand of bullshit on improving men and not demeaning women.

But he does so through the same tired and harmful ways of internalizing shame to be weaponized as a motivator to compete in the mating market.

You'll never be enough until you win capitalism and then have a family and then provide for that family. And this worked for him, so he's happy to preach it.

If I just get a girlfriend, any decent girlfriend, then I'll have a wife and be happy.

Now you've got a man who derives his value from his partner, and suddenly jealousy, anger, and resentment start to creep in when that relationship goes through natural ebbs and flows.

Same thing with placing all of your value on your career. Lose your job and now who are you? You're in my office trying to rebuild a sense of self from the ground up is who you probably are.

I just thought that was a very interesting comment. I think that's a really thoughtful comment, what she wrote, and I'll take it to heart.

I think there's a kernel of truth in it because when it hits me, it hits me hard and I don't like it, which probably means there's some truth in it.

The retort would be, will me be, me finding self-worth pay for my health insurance for me and my kids? And I'm not suggesting you need to be a baller and make millions of dollars.

I'm suggesting in a capitalist society where in America we believe in winners and losers and the safety net is near the ground that you need to be economically viable.

Look, unfortunately, I've lived to work for a long time such that I could get to economic security because I didn't think I have trauma around. That's my way.

I acknowledge it may not be the right way. I think there are a lot of people who decide they want to work to live.
They move to a lower cost neighborhood. They have decent jobs.

They don't need a Range Rover. They don't need to go to San Trope.
They want a decent house. They want to coach Little League.
They want to go to church. More power to them.

What I'm suggesting is that people have an honest conversation around their expectations economically and the sacrifice required to get there. So that was the interaction.

We and you frame masculinity in economic terms in a lot of ways. There's a lot of discussion of earnings and status and productivity, ambition, etc.

So just your reactions to the clip and then as a larger question for this conversation, the question is, to what extent does money impact your understanding and your conception of what it means to be a man?

So I think a really fair criticism of the book is that I reverse engineer what's worked for me to advise for everybody and that what's worked for me is to try and

take risks and initiate conversations

with strangers and demonstrate kindness and establish a large friendship group and ultimately establish what have been really rewarding friendships, mentorships, and romantic relationships for me.

And that also

the stress I had as a younger person was related to economic scarcity or not having enough money.

And so working really hard, which came at a cost and developing economic security, has been very rewarding for me.

And I reverse engineer back from economic success and having a partner to what everyone should do.

And it's a fair criticism to say, well, just winning at capitalism and having a romantic partner, a lot of, you know, some people, A, may choose that that's not their priority.

And B, may not have those avenues accessible to them.

And they still should be focused on how to find purpose and deeper meaning such that they can be happy, even if they don't achieve either or both of those things. I think that's a fair criticism.

And I like a world

where

I'll give you an example.

My elementary school principal, Mr.

Euchlson, used to drive up in a 240Z and he was this handsome man and really a nice man and wonderful to the kids and used to come out and high-five us and play tetherball with us.

And he smelled nice and he was a high school principal. And he just was like, he was my image.
And I think the community's image of masculinity.

And I don't think that's no longer the case. I think that unfortunately, because America has become so driven on money, your healthcare is different, your mating selection set is different.

Your opportunities for influence, everything is just so driven by money now in the U.S.

The life you can lead if you're wealthy is so extraordinary and the life you lead is so awful if you don't have money that I'm down for a world where we return to having greater respect for our military,

the guy who gets up and works a solid eight hours at a good job, doesn't have to be a great job, a guy who's interesting and funny. Unfortunately, I don't know.

I don't think that's the world we live in any longer.

And that men are disproportionately, especially young men, are disproportionately evaluated based on their economic viability.

And I'm down for the world where character character starts to override, where the most admired person is someone with high character, not someone worth $400 billion.

So I'm down for that world. I just don't know if that's the world we live in.

And I do stand by the notion that as a man in a capitalist society, you are going to be unfairly and disproportionately evaluated based on your economic viability.

And I'm not suggesting you need to go to work for Goldman Sachs, but you need to have a plan.

You need to have the discipline to spend less than you make, pursue certification, demonstrate grit, work hard, such that at some point you might be in a position, should you choose to, be able to support or at least be a large contributor to the family.

And unfortunately, the world, potential mates, and probably most importantly, yourself, are going to be very harsh on you if you are not able to establish economic viability.

The likelihood of divorce doubles when the woman in the relationship starts making more money than the man, the use of ED drugs triples.

And I think there is something to the notion that we need to recognize that women have borne the majority of the emotional labor at home and haven't been adequately compensated or recognized, and that modern masculinity needs to have some form

of reward and celebration of modern masculinity. And at my last stop for the pivot tour, I got the opportunity to highlight two of my mentors who are role models for me.

And one was my best friend's stepfather, who met my friend's mother when he was 23 and she was 30. They were in law school.
She had two kids. They got married.
They'd been together 55 years.

He was the ultimate kind of California stud, the super handsome guy, first guy that took me and Adam to go work out with weights and then took us to the school sushi place.

And as his career grew, he was a great provider. The California dream of cars just kept getting better.

He had a 240Z, then he had a Porsche 9-11, and then he had the ultimate expression of masculinity and California dream and lifestyle of Ferrari.

But for the last 12 years, he's been taking care of his wife of 55 years, who is struggling with pretty late-stage dementia.

And I think almost anyone I know would have put her, decided to put her in an assisted living facility. And I'm not exaggerating, Ed, this guy,

this guy is just a full-time caregiver. And I think that we need to do a better job

of incorporating that type of service into some form of masculinity and that kind of emotional labor. You know, and I need to choose the right words for it because

I don't even think it's like you have to be,

provider has to be, take on more dimensions. So, I mean, the honest truth is I need, I still have work to do around this.
And I think that's a valid criticism.

The shit that pisses me off that's all over TikTok that just isn't accurate.

And I can tell it's someone just that wants to be angry and draft off the algorithms is when they start saying, here's another man that's blaming women. I do not blame women.
I think I just don't.

If you read the book, I blame young men themselves that need to step up. Men, my generation, need to get more involved in their lives.

Societal transfer of money from young to old, which has disproportionately hurt young men. you know, big tech.

But the last people I blame, I say, look, women's assent is young men and everyone else would have been much worse off if we had not welcomed welcomed women into the workforce.

And women should not lower their standards. Men need to raise their game, so to speak.
So that's the pushback that I seem to be getting a lot online where I know they haven't read the book.

And I understand the gag reflex because people immediately assume you're Andrew Tate when you start advocating for men. But just to circle back, I think that criticism is accurate.

The only thing I would say is that every time I hear a therapist Every time people start off, I'm an actual, they start off with Scott Galloway is a professor of marketing.

He doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about. I'm a therapist, and I do know what I'm talking about.
That's fair. Although I will say I've done a decent amount of research on the topic.

And they always go to men need to work on themselves.

And it's like a therapist sees, is a hammer, and everything they see is a nail or a need for therapy and working on yourself. And I would put forward that I think therapy is a great thing.

I've recommended it for a lot of people. I think it can be very helpful.

But I think if we can create a society where more young people have the opportunity to have a good job and find a mate, that almost everything else is going to fall into place.

And that the majority of America cannot afford to go on a ketamine journey in therapy to discover their true purpose.

And that if you give them a good job and a chance to find someone and it should they choose to raise a family, that that's going to solve a lot of problems we face.

I think your point, which is something that ought to be said, is that money plays a larger role in masculinity than we'd like to believe. 100%.

And the studies that you reference kind of elucidate that.

You know, the study of marriages where they find that the less money the husband makes and the more time the husband spends unemployed, the higher likelihood that the couple gets divorced.

And the reverse is not true for women. If the woman is not making a lot of money, it has no...
uh has no impact on the likelihood of divorce.

We've also seen it in the studies of online dating where we found that men who have higher incomes receive 10 times more profile visits than men who have lower listed incomes.

And again, the reverse is not true of women. Men don't care about the income.

And by the way, I understand that this is all heteronormative, but this is the conversation, this is the nature of the conversation we're discussing largely here, the relationship between men and women.

So. That's the research that shows us that actually money seems to play a role here.

And I think that that's the thing that you're trying to put out there that perhaps the therapists haven't really recognized for a long time in the national conversation.

It's all fine and good to say, oh, work on yourself.

But if you can't make any money and you can't provide for anyone, and we are living, as you say, in a capitalist society where you are measured on these things, then that makes your life a lot more difficult.

It would probably be easier if you just had a solution which said, bang, here's some money. So that's one side of it.
On the other side of it, these studies have all been talked about a lot.

by

the incel influencers who you reference there. And there there is a growing movement online called the Black Pill Movement, which talks all about this.

And it's basically this growing ideology, specifically among young men, many of whom identify as incels, involuntary celibates. They want to have sex, but they can't have sex.

And the idea is that all that women really care about when you get down to it is money and status. And you can kind of get away with it if you're attractive.

But if you're not attractive, the only way to find a girlfriend, the only way to be loved by a woman is to accumulate wealth and power. This is what a lot of young men believe now.

And it has given rise to some very controversial figures whose views you probably do not agree with. Andrew Tate, as an example, who has said, quote, women want money and they use love to get it.

Nick Fuentes, another example, he said, women want the man to be rich and they want the man to provide. Myron Gaines, who's another sort of incel influencer.

These are all controversial people who are in many cases self-described misogynists.

I mean, a lot of their actual belief is that women are worse than men or dumber than men or deserve a lesser role in society than men. But

their beliefs also about money and about masculinity in a lot of ways overlap with yours.

This idea that we need to be talking more about the very large role that money has to play in masculinity and in men's ability to attract potential mates.

So I think the big question to think about is what makes your conception of masculinity different? I think most people, anyone who knows you even slightly knows that you're not Andrew Tate.

You have a very different message. But what they're right in identifying is that in some ways, the ideas overlap, specifically when it comes to money and how important that is in being a man.

So how would you respond to that? And what do you think of that?

So one of the things, the most dangerous things about clinical demandosphere is I think it starts off pretty positive. Be action-oriented, be fit, make money.
And then it just comes off the rails.

And the reason why you make money is not only to attract mates, but to dominate them.

to put them back in the 50s where they're barefoot and pregnant and their needs, wants and desires are subjugated to yours. And they're basically just a support system.

They're just basically IV nutrition for your awesomeness.

And that's just not, the far right recognized the problem first. The problem is they want to take women and non-whites back to the 50s.

And we now live in a world where women, when we level the playing field, women not only caught up, but in many fields, they blew by us.

Now, where I do unfortunately think the world has come off the tracks.

And we need to push more money back into the middle class such that people can have some reasonable semblance of a life without making a shit ton of money, $25 an hour minimum wage, universal child tax credit, lower the cost of education.

It has become such the hunger games where the temptation to try and find someone who has money

is the difference between a bad life and a good life.

And so I think a lot of this is structural. I don't blame, I mean, quite frankly, the importance that people place on money as sexual currency for when evaluating males, it's actually gotten worse.

You would think as we become a more progressive and enlightened community, that people would be more evaluating men on their kindness or their character. And it's gotten worse.

And it's not because we're less evolved. It's because that America has basically become the best place in the world for people with money and the worst place in the world for people without it.

And so the temptation to try and find a partner who has economic viability is only increased.

At the same time, men have to get past themselves and realize that there are different ways to be a provider.

When my partner got a job at Goldman Sachs and was making more money than me, I did step up and got home for bath time and tried to be really supportive of her because at that moment she was better at this whole money thing.

And also, there's different types of being a provider, trying to stay engaged in the marriage, trying to

pick up the emotional and logistical support. The reason why divorce rates have skyrocketed is there's some good things in the sense that women no longer feel economically indentured to men.

They have more freedom. But two, as women have ascended economically, men have not matched that ascent domestically or emotionally at home.
So a lot of women are just bottom line waking up.

And the seven tenths who do the divorce filings, women are saying, this is no longer a good transaction. So I just don't think there's getting any way around it.

Women, unfortunately, society, women, and men themselves have placed a disproportionate, increasing amount of emphasis,

connection between mating currency and economic viability or making a lot of money because now just making a good living doesn't seem to get you a lot in the U.S.

But where I would like to think I'm entirely different is that I think men need to figure out a way

and our society needs to celebrate different forms of providing and contribution to the relationship for periods where we can celebrate our mothers and our sisters' ascent professionally.

I think it's a wonderful thing. And if anyone thinks that women's ascent has come at the cost of men, they don't understand economics.

Because had women not gotten into factories and started building our P-51s, we would still be fighting World War II in 1948.

And if women hadn't entered the workforce in the 60s, 70s, 80s in America, we'd be a second-rate power to China. This bullshit on the right, what these guys say is that the man needs to be a provider.

Okay, I get that. They claim that all these women would have been told a lie, that focus on your career, you become a partner at the law firm, and now you're alone, childless, and miserable.

You've been sold a lie. No, they haven't.
So what does they want?

What do these folks in the far right want?

They want women who might end up alone for a variety of factors, maybe just because they don't want to engage in a relationship and they're happier with their friend network or they don't find a guy that meets their standards.

And then they're also fucking broke. I was raised by a woman who had a series of boyfriends, nothing ever worked out long term, and was also economically strained.

And let me tell you, that's not good either. So the fact that women want economic independence, well, of course they do.

What, they're supposed to go all in on finding a dude and then be relying on him economically. So I don't, where I part company,

I like them, think men need to very much aspire to be economically viable. The truth is Beyonce could work at McDonald's and marry Jay-Z.
The opposite is not true.

Men are disproportionately and unfairly evaluated based on their economic viability. Women are unfairly and disproportionately evaluated on their aesthetics.
That is not the way the world should be.

It is the way the world is. Where I part company with these guys is that lifting women into equal opportunity and let them run through the tape and have economic viability and security.

It is up to society and to men to accept that, embrace it, endorse it, and be the afterburners on that. But there are some big knock-on effects we're going to have to address.

We'll be right back after the break. And by the way, we will be recording an Ask Me Anything episode in a couple of weeks.

So drop your questions for us in the comments or email them to markets at profgymedia.com.

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We're back with profit markets. This idea that, so women are disproportionately and unfairly evaluated based on their looks, which I agree with.

I think that that is

the nature of

biology. As is being a provider, is.
And this is what I'm going to get to, which is the same thing is true of being a provider, which is where if that is true, I start to run into

issues with when you say,

if your wife is better at this whole money thing, then part of what it means to be a man is to get out of the way. As you say, you know, your wife was making more money working at Goldman Sachs.

You decided to come home and take care of the kids, which I like that as a story, but it's hard to fit it in with this framework.

If we're all agree, if we're agreeing that money is systemically important to what it means to be a man, not because of the money, but because of this providing aspect, then how do we also say at the same time that being a stay-at-home dad is also what it means to be a man?

And I'm not saying that it's not what it means to be a man, but I think that that needs to be defined.

I mean, what what is it about you coming home early while your wife is out making more money than you that you believe does fit with what it means to be a man? In what ways did it actually

make you feel more masculine, if at all? It didn't. I mean, I did, if we're going to have an honest conversation, we should have an honest conversation.

I think deep down when I meet a dude that's a stay-at-home dad, I don't meet him there often, but I usually do. I think, oh, dude's not a player.
Dude couldn't hack it in the professional world.

It's a terrible thing to think, but I think it.

And I think, oh, you know, she had to settle for a dude that can't make money or can't make enough to justify the childcare. And I think the majority of the world looks at that person that way.

And we can, we, no matter how many subscriptions the Atlantic or the New York Times we have, I think people are going to instinctively have that reaction.

And the question is, how do we train our society to be a little bit more forgiving or a little bit more rewarding of the emotional labor that women provide when men start providing it?

But you're fighting instinct. I mean, there's just no getting around it.
And

the question is, what do you do about it? I would argue that things like universal childcare give, make it easier for both people to try and find some level of work.

Because I think where relationships that I've seen kind of come off the tracks is that

The man's not economically viable at all, and they can't even afford for him to try and go out and workshop a career because childcare is so fucking expensive.

And I think there'd be less anxiety in households if both people could contribute economically. I think most men want to work.
I mean,

more power to you. I'm making reductive statements, and there are now, I think it's 16% of households where the women's the primary or who makes more money than in dual-income households.

I think that most men would rather,

and this is maybe not true of all men. I'm being very, I'm making huge generalizations.

I think we need to provide families with less economic angst such that if in fact women want to leverage their excellence academically, the fact that they're finally getting their due professionally, if they're making more money than the man, that's fine.

But I think we need to level up all young people such that more people

have economic viability in the marketplace, which I think just as it disproportionately hurt men when younger people had less opportunity, I think it will disproportionately help men when we put more money in the pockets of young people.

Because

I don't think think it's the woman making more money that causes divorce and anxiety. I think it's the woman just quite frankly

contributing way more on all levels.

And it's like, okay, boss, this, at the end of the day, a relationship is somewhat of a transaction.

And so I think just giving young people more opportunity to both have jobs and contribute economically. And I just still think the dollar sign next to the dude is still unfairly a sign of his manhood.

And I'm not sure that we're going to be able to starch that out in years or even decades. I think it's going to take hundreds of years.
I just think that's instinctively how we evaluate men.

So what is the answer? What if it's how you evaluate men? What if it's

you believe that money...

that the dollar sign holds a lot of weight. And by the way, just to be clear with you, I feel the same way.
But I'm just, I want to

play out the argument from, say, the therapist or say the woman who disagrees. What if the woman says, no, you don't get it? Actually, I don't care about the dollar sign.
I care about something else.

And I have theories on what I think the something else is. which I will share in a moment.

But what would you say to that?

Or do you believe that maybe they like to tell themselves that? Or we like to tell ourselves we don't really care about it, but ultimately we do.

My personal experience is that when I was a professor at NY Eastern making $160 or $180,000 a year, and my partner at the time, we had just had a kid and she got a job making $300,000 at Goldman her first year out of business school.

I didn't feel less masculine. I definitely didn't feel more masculine, but I saw this as a team.
I was contributing to the relationship. I stepped up.

Stepped up with domestic work, taking care of the kids. I did bath time.
I, you know,

I took the kids. I don't know.
I'm doing some virtue signaling here, but yeah, I did step up, or I like to think I stepped up. And I didn't make me feel less masculine

because I was, in fact,

you know, still working. Now, in terms of the actual data,

it's only getting worse. And that is, look at the dating apps.

You know, men who are wealthy get so much more attention.

And

if you look at, I mean, everything around,

you know, what are your minimums, the whole six feet, six figures thing,

because we live in a hunger games-like economy now, I just think that it's become, and I hate to say this, it's become increasingly

important.

And all the data, 75% of women say economic viability is key to a mate. It's 25% for men.
Women say, there's a lot of dissonance. I want a sensitive man.
I don't think women want a sensitive man.

I think they want a guy that notices their life.

But I don't necessarily think they want an overly sensitive man. I don't think they find that attractive.

So there's sort of how people respond in surveys and what they write editorials in the Atlantic on. And then there's actually how people actually decide who they want to sleep with.

If the dude's making 80 grand and the female in the partnership's making $120,000, I think that marriage survives. That's okay.
It's not a scorecard.

But when

the woman is making 120, the dude's making nothing, and he's not great at home, and he's a fucking insecure mess because he's hard on himself, that guy becomes really unattractive.

And

I don't, you know, therapy, love yourself, maybe that'll work. Here's an idea.

Universal child care and $25 minimum wage and break up big tech and companies such that there's more jobs and more opportunities for young people.

I don't, the only place I go here to try and solve this problem is to hope that we evolve and that we continue to talk about emotional labor and how men can contribute on a variety of levels.

But my solution is to put more money in the pockets of young people, level them up such that they don't experience the economic anxiety that ends marriages.

But I don't, I just think that, I think the reality is it's only gotten worse in terms of society, a man's view of himself, and a woman's view of his sexual currency as being increasingly correlated, not decreasingly correlated, to how much fucking money he makes.

And society in America has made it such that the difference between having money and not having money is, as I said with Katie,

Okay, you've worked on yourself. Great.
Is that going to get you health insurance for your kids?

So I don't like the world we're living in. My attitude is how do we fix it? And my viewpoint is massive programs to put more money in the pockets of all young people.

Going back to the dating app example and those studies that you mentioned, which are totally true. When you look at these dating apps, it is just tried and true.

We know that women care about how much money is being made.

If that is a parameter that is able to be listed, if you're making more money, you're going to get more attention and affirmation from women.

I think the trouble with using these studies and looking at these dating apps as a guide is that the dating apps are so flawed and stupid to begin with. I mean,

yes, maybe those guys are getting more attention, but we also know about women that many of them are just not happy with the way the dating world works.

I mean, many women don't want to sleep with or engage with relationships with men at all. In fact, we're seeing many women in America saying they just want to leave America.

They just want out on this whole system. I think part of the problem is when we look at those dating apps as sort of indicative of sociology and the way humans work, it's kind of

misguides us away from the point. Yes,

if we were to look within that paradigm, you want to be making more money, but perhaps the paradigm is rigged to begin with, and perhaps it's not actually a true reflection of what women want.

So I just want to give you my take on this what women want question

as it relates to money. I think what you say about being a provider and the idea that being a provider can manifest itself in many different ways is actually extremely important.

Because I don't think it's that women want money.

I think it's that women want a man who is mature and who can make them feel safe and feel a sense of security. And money turns out to be a pretty good indicator of those attributes.

But it's not exclusive. It's not exclusive.
And there could be a man who makes a lot of money and who is obsessed with it. And I think this is where women start to get anxious about your points.

Someone who derives his value from how much money he has. And that's probably...

pretty unattractive to women because he might have the money, but he also might be quite emotionally unstable, which is actually a risk to the women, evolutionarily speaking.

He might just toss her away, move on to the next woman, cheat on her, maybe he'll be be an absent father, etc.

I don't think that those things have any relevance in hookup culture and in dating app culture because they're not measured. But I do think in relationships,

they are really important. And what women are looking for is the stability, the loyalty, the long-term support, and money can be an indicator of those things.

But it all goes back to what you say, which is providing. Is this person going to provide for me? And can we

find

in our exploration of masculinity many different examples of ways in which men can provide that aren't necessarily he's making $200,000, $300,000 a year? I'm with you. And I think that's right.
And,

you know,

demonstrating excellence in different ways. showing up, being good.
I think there's a lot of people going to have happy marriages that way. And I say that.

And all the data I see is that it's headed the other way.

And let me just ask you, and this is anecdotal, of all your friends, right?

The guy who's a good guy, nice guy, fun, but is kind of struggling professionally.

And then the guy who maybe is not that interesting, not that funny, not that good looking, but is just killing it professionally. Tell me about their currency in the sexual marketplace.

So I was with you on the guy who's struggling

is not going to have value in the sexual marketplace. The guy who's killing it, but isn't funny or interesting or magnanimous or charming.
I actually don't, I don't think he's anywhere either.

Good for women. Maybe that's why maybe women have decided, I got my own bank.
I don't need this douchebag. I think he could buy his way into

a temporary and surface level relationship.

I think the second guy can have sex. I think he could figure that out.
But I don't think that ultimately when the

woman sees what's really going on, which is this is someone who isn't actually self-actualized and is less stable than the money seems to suggest. I think at that point, that guy runs into trouble.

The first time I sort of connected money and sexual currency was the following. When I was in high school, Nobody knew how much money anybody had.
I wasn't at a disadvantage.

I had a lack of self-esteem because

I went to a high school back when public high schools had different people from different economic classes university high school and u.s on the west side uh single mother secretary i didn't have a lot of money no one cared i wasn't fun i was i was insecure with bad acne and tall and skinny okay that took my sexual currency down on its own but the kids who were from rich families you know they had nicer sweaters maybe and you heard about their nice but no one really cared i got to college and i was in a primarily jewish fraternity.

And these kids were all super ambitious. I think two-thirds of my pledge brothers went to law school or medical school.

And I remember the little sister chairman, we have this ridiculous thing called little sisters where a bunch of women show up and become your little sister.

It's basically the women who are going to hang out and like your fraternity and come to your parties and eventually maybe get boyfriends there.

And

I remember saying, I remember looking at the list from the guy who was the list as chair, and we had like four times the number of seniors applying to be little sisters as freshmen.

And I said, that doesn't make any sense. And he said, oh, no, no, no, no.
He said,

we Jews aren't nearly as popular with the freshmen because they're going for the hot going, whatever you term. He goes, by the time they're seniors,

they start going for the doctors and lawyers.

And it was like, I realized it was the first time I connected money and success to sexual currency.

And my observation as I've gotten older is in the last 40 years, it's just gotten so much worse

because the opportunities, the upside so much greater if you have money and the downside so much worse if you don't.

But I don't,

your observation was really an interesting one. The guys can no longer just be professionally successful and feel entitled.
I think that's probably a good thing.

And I think women having the confidence, some of the research shows, you know, there's this cartoon of a woman in her 30s who never found romantic love. What a tragedy.

She's in the windowsill thinking about antidepressants and feeding her seven cats and looking out on a rainy day. Actually, the research shows she's fine.

Yeah, maybe she would have liked to have had a family, but she's okay.

If a dude hasn't cohabitated with a woman or been married by the time he's 30, There's a one in three chance he's going to be a substance abuser. Widows are happier after their husband dies.

Widowers are less less happy. It ends up the men need relationships more than women.
And I think a lot of women are saying, are doing the math and going, you know what? I make a good living.

Yeah, I don't, I don't, you know, I find that the offering out there, I find the products being offered out there

are not appealing to me. And I'm no longer economically indentured.
And maybe I can have a kid on my own. Maybe I don't want to have kids.

And so at the end of the day, I mean, the only thing I don't like about the in-cell movement, I think it's the V-cel movement.

I think they're kind of voluntarily celibate because they have given up working on themselves. I was in incel until I was 19.
I would have liked to have had sex much earlier than that.

So I worked on myself.

I worked out. I took Accutane to clear up my skin.
I got a plan. I went to UCLA.
I developed a kindness practice.

I developed the ability to approach a woman and have her reject me and then realize I was okay.

I started hanging around with interesting, funny people that indicated I was interesting and funny.

I worked on it so I could no longer, so I no longer would be celibate. That was tremendously motivating.

But these dudes who just claim the world is against them and that no woman would want to be with them, okay, go be a fucking apprentice at a vocational job, show you work hard, hit the gym two or three times a week, be a little bit more well-read, develop a kindness practice, go to church nonprofits, sports leagues, reading clubs, learn how to approach people, learn what works and what doesn't.

You will find somebody. I think there are probably some incels out there who would say, no, no, you don't understand it.
I really am trying. And it really, it's really not happening.

But your point is very true that there are, this has become such a cultural movement that there are even now economic incentives among these influencers and

these incel influencers to be incels. And the perfect example is Nick Fuentes, who's like kind of the leader of this whole movement.

And you know, he has actually been that there are videos of him being approached by women and people on his live streams, women on his live streams saying, I'm actually super into you, to which he'll say things like, no, I'm an incel.

That's not me. I'm someone someone who doesn't get with women.
I don't get the girls. You don't understand.
And it's like, okay, this is exactly what you're describing.

This is now turning into a vol it's v cell. It's you're voluntarily celibate.

You're actively choosing, you don't want to participate because you'd prefer to be in the comfort of the victim mindset and believe that the world is unfair and everything's stacked against you.

And here's my group of incels.

And we prefer just closing ourselves off off from the world and complaining about things and complaining about immigrants and women and how women are stupid and all they care about is money and all of these things that feel kind of empowering in the moment.

But long term, I mean, good luck to you if that's going to be your solution. If that's the way that you think that young men should be living their lives, like have at it.

You're going to get nowhere with that philosophy. And it's, I just, I do want to highlight that because it's so true what you say.
There are, there are more V

than the incels would like to admit. I think it's a form of anger and mental illness.
I also think there's some women who,

just to be fair, blame men for everything and have decided to live alone and not even try

and

just demonstrate. I don't like the word misandre, but I'll use it.

But I do think it's more prevalent among men. And

And look,

I can just tell you as you get older,

you know, money is the means. The ends are relationships.
And this notion that you can take pride in not connecting with people,

look,

I think there's some people who decide to be celibate for whatever reason

or not have a romantic relationship or they're fine with their friends and their family. Okay, fine.

But at the end of your life, the only thing you're going to have, the only thing you're going to have, the only thing that's going to provide comfort is

the number of deep and meaningful relationships you have.

And it just breaks my heart that these bigots, nihilists are trying to convince other young men that it's somehow okay and even aspirational to give up on relationships. No, it's not.
I mean,

there are a lot of people out there. The number of searches on Google for how do I make friends, places to meet people, has gone up.
There are people out there that want to be your friend.

We live in almost a full employment economy. You can add value.
You can find a job. In a capitalist society, if you have a job and you have friends,

you can find a lot of meaning in providing support and concern for other people.

And the last thing you want, the last thing you want, the last feeling you'll feel will be failure if you die under bright lights surrounded by strangers.

If there was anything I could communicate, if I could wrap my arms around all young men who are in relationships and have given up trying, the 63% of men that stop dating, the 14% of men who are neither, or the needs neither in education or

employment or training.

If I could communicate anything to them, like if I could transmorph any belief and just say, trust me on this, it's that the anxiety and depression you're going to feel having spent a lot of your life alone and not trying to engage in relationships is going to be exponentially greater than the fear of anything that waits for you outside of that room.

You know, get out, take risks, endure rejection,

level up, work out, try to have a plan, try to be kind, try again, try again,

and, you know, make friends, make mentors, make mates if you can.

That is the whole shooting match. That's it.
I just don't buy.

And these guys going down these rabbit holes online. Oh my God, that's a future of anxiety and self-loathing.

We'll be right back. For even more markets content, sign up for our our newsletter at profitmarkets.com/slash subscribe.

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We're back with Prof G Markets. To me, it seems like the

The magic of money isn't the money when it comes to sexual value and what it does in terms of your sexual currency. The magic of money is what it does to you as a person.
And that is,

it's not that the woman wants you because you have the Lamborghini and the shiny car.

It's that if you have money,

it probably means that you are more self-actualized. You've figured out something that you're good at and you're monetizing it.
You're more confident. You believe in yourself.
You are more stable.

You're more secure.

you feel less anxiety, you're less, you feel less like less of a victim because you are less of a victim if you have money.

Even for the rich kids in college, where it's like, is it the money that they're after or is it what the money is doing?

to the psychology of those people and this idea that they probably are walking around with an air of greater confidence. And I feel like that's sort of the the distinction that needs to be made.

Because

if you believe that it is just the money, then the answer is

just get more money. That'll solve your problem.
And I want to be clear, this is what the Black Pill movement is about. It's, no, no, it is simply the money.
It is that the women want the money.

It's that the women want to be driving around in the Lamborghini. So if you get the money and you get the Lamborghini, you've solved the problem.

What I am putting forward is the idea that it's not actually just the money.

It's what the money can give to you on a personal level and how it can make you feel and project more of what it means to be a man.

And that's the part that I kind of want to get your views on.

So, okay, there's the money itself and the life it affords, and then there's the attributes that come along typically with someone who's able to be successful professionally. So the reason why,

or what research indicates, is that women aren't actually visually drawn to a man who is in great shape. They're drawn to the attributes that reflects.
This guy shows up. This guy is disciplined.

Exactly. This guy demonstrates the attributes of who might be a good partner.
Should money be a signal? Yeah.

But what you said about the dude who,

you know, the money isn't just

the guy who makes a shit ton of money and has to be gaddy, but quite frankly, it's a low-character person. You're right.

My observation, and this is anecdotal because it's hard to assess statistically the character of somebody. But my sense is he can attract sexual partners, but they may not be very high character.

That's the thing. And I think this is where young men are getting misguided is you see Andrew Tate with the Bugatti and he has like a harem of Instagram models with him.

And it's like, oh, that's the solution. Like, I'm not getting laid.
I can't figure out how to talk to a woman. He's got 10 of them.
And I see the Bugatti.

So therefore, one Bugatti must equal 10 women. But

they're probably being paid to be there.

They're almost certainly being paid to be there.

And it seems to be like a just a totally misguided

solution to the problem that we're not connecting with each other.

Like even if you achieve that and you take a photo of you with 10 women, who, I mean, I doubt that there is any sense of actual relationship or connection between any of those women and Andrew Tate.

Sure, he's solved the I'm not physically in the company of women problem,

but has he solved the relationship problem? Has he solved the love problem, the loneliness problem? I doubt he's solved any of those problems.

And so that's why I think

what

we need is, and which what I like about your message of providing is solving for the other problems of actual connection with a woman, not just to have sex with a woman.

You can go to Andrew Tate for those lessons and he's wrong about many of them, in my view. But the connection.

And that seems to be what's actually missing for a lot of young men and what a lot of young men actually want. It's like, it's not even about, I want to have sex.

It's like, I want to have a companion in life. I try to do an assessment of my addictions.

And an addiction is something you continue to engage in despite knowing it's harming other parts of your life. And yet you continue to engage in it.
I'm addicted to the affirmation of strangers.

I continue to work harder than I should. I continue to take other people's opinion more seriously than I should.
I'm desperate for affirmation despite the fact I'm going to be dead soon.

And it really doesn't fucking matter what strangers think of me.

And occasionally, my obsession with what strangers think of me takes me out of my head and I'm out of his present with the people who do, in fact, love me and I do, in fact, love a great deal.

That's an addiction. And it's pathetic at my age to still be that way.
And now some of those embers probably make me more successful. But at this point, why do I need?

Anyways, that's an addiction. My other addiction is money.
I'm traumatized by it. It solved a lot of problems for me.
I was able to take care of my mother.

I was able to do things I'd always wanted to do, feel better about myself.

I have more money than I'm ever going to be to spend, but I still just accepted a speaking gig for a quarter of a million bucks in Jackson Hole because it's a quarter of a million dollars.

And then I think, oh, God, I got to get on, it's not, by the way, there's no direct flights from London to Jackson Hole yet. I didn't know if you knew that.

So I'm basically going to be out of my home for three days. And when I get back at my age, I'm going to be a fucking chocolate mess for two days.

So it's like everyone loses dad and their partner for a week for me to get a quarter of a million bucks. I will lose a half a million or a million bucks in the market up or down today.

Why am I doing this?

And it's because I didn't, I had so little money when I was growing up. I can't, I can't resist it.
And then I start making rationalizations. Well, I'll give it away.

I don't need it, but I'll give it away. Think about how much good I, and yet I continue to damage my health.
I continue to not damage my relationships, but not invest.

I got one more Thanksgiving with my oldest son and he's gone. He's in college.
90% of the time you spend with your kids is up until the age of 18. Why the fuck am I going to Jackson Hole? Why? Right.

And it's because I've been for so long trained to believe that economic security was absolutely, you know, absolutely everything. And

I can't get off that hamster wheel, but I do think that at some point with money and partnership, the most rewarding thing in my life has been not having the money as I thought about it.

Well, having the money is pretty cool. But a close second and maybe even first is I made it with a partner.

The funnest thing about money is the making it, not even having it, I don't think.

I mean, it's great to have it, but if you can find a high character partner and you demonstrate character and you build something together, that is disco.

Because if I think if you have a lot of money, I think sometimes if you're not a high high-character person, as you said, the people you're going to attract aren't necessarily what I call high-value people.

They may not even like you. Yeah.
But the real high-character, high-value women, they get Ed Elson.

They get a nice, attractive, balanced guy who's a fucking baller professionally and is going to be able to provide. They get to have it all.

So everybody in this mating race wants to have a really high character, high value partner.

And one of the boxes you need to check if you want that person, I would argue, or a greater selection or opportunity of those people includes real economic trajectory.

Well, that's very nice of you to say about me. Thank you.

It seems as though

the money thing is one game in life. It's like there are many different games that you can play in life.
And it's almost like when you're describing checking the boxes, money is just a giant one.

It's a giant, you want to show, if you want to be

a man, if you want to be sort of like what it means to be a man, if you want to embrace a sense of masculinity, it's like you need to

demonstrate that you can play that game and you can win that game to a certain degree. But it's almost like there are all of these other games that you need to be able to demonstrate that you can win.

You need to be able to demonstrate that you can be dependable emotionally, that you can be kind,

that you can sort of handle a lot of pressure and you don't crack. Like there are all of these different metrics, I feel like, for what it means to be a man.

I so agree with your point that it's like we've become so obsessed with money as a society that it's almost taken up all of the space in the room to the point where we can't even keep our eye on the ball and all of the other things that are important and substantive in what it it means to be a man.

And what I would hate to see is

this idea that, like,

because you're emphasizing that money does play a role, your message is being interpreted by other people, by your critics who are not reading the book, and saying that's all

that matters.

But you've just said it right there. It's like

you

care deeply about money

and you have an addiction addiction to money

and yet it isn't everything. And it's not even what made you and what make you an aspirational figure, both to your wife and to your fans and your listeners, because it wasn't about having the money.

It was about all of the things. It was about making the money.
It was about sharing the money. It was about building.

that economic security with someone, laying out a plan, having a trajectory, all of those other things that actually weirdly aren't even about the money. And I feel like that's the thing that

maybe your critics,

I would hope they understood that more about you.

Yeah, but you got to keep in mind, if you don't have critics, you're not saying anything, or at least that's what I try to tell myself as I cry into my pillow.

But I'll give you an example, Ed.

I have traveled 180 days a year for 30 years, and it's usually on someone else's dime. So I stay at beautiful places.
And inevitably, I'll be at the George Sank in Paris or I'll be at a, I don't know,

whatever it is, the almond in Tokyo. And inevitably, if I'm alone, I get upgraded to some ridiculously fat fucking suite.

Inevitably. And you know what, how much value registers when you're alone in that fat fucking suite? I'm not exaggerating.
I've gotten upgraded and I call and I say, how much does this room cost?

And

they're like, oh, that room's this sweet. It would be, we would charge 12 or 15 grand a night.

It's worth $300 to me because that's what I can get a bed for. If I'm not there with someone, it's meaningless.
Yes. It's meaningless.
It's like, it doesn't register.

If I can't share it with somebody, it has no value. I mean, literally, it's like, it didn't happen.
Who cares? And it's not only like, okay,

I could be dating a model and she would be really into it and, you know,

be impressed by me. What you want is, I mean, the real goal is even if it's like a decent hotel at Disneyland with your kids, you can like

go to sleep with someone and you built it together. And it's like, you get to do these great things because you have this great partnership and you get to share it.

And

I think getting to stay at some tacky hotel in Disney World that you saved up all year on, but that the kids are next door and you're with someone you enjoy, fuck, that is so much more rewarding

than being alone in a $12,000 suite at the almond. What I worry about is that there's so much wrapped up into self-esteem, the way society.

the way society evaluates you that as a young man, if you don't at least develop a plan for economic security, just a plan.

You don't have to show up with the Range Rover or the Panorai, but I'm going to vocational school. I'm getting my GED and I'm going to vocational school and

I'm going to be a plumber's apprentice or I'm taking, I'm going to try, I'm working for a company that installs,

you know, cabinetry and this is my plan. And you demonstrate discipline.
No, I got to go home. I got to get up early.
I work hard.

I think that's a pretty decent path. And I worry that big tech seducing men offline or seducing them to go online, that they're not developing confidence.
They're not working out.

They're not around people to develop social skills,

that they're just literally like shutting off all the arteries to relationships. And they're going to wake up.

And even if they get the money, even if they figure out that, oh, maybe I'm wrong, maybe Andrew Tate's crypto trading platform, they can make millions on.

And they wake up with a million bucks, they're out of shape, they're anxious, they see women is just like,

what they envision a woman is based on the porn they've consumed and they really never have a true partner.

What I would offer up, unfortunately, is in order to get to that good partnership, it's going to be really difficult if you don't demonstrate as a man economic viability or the potential to be economically viable.

It's unfair. It shouldn't be as big as an important as it is, but it is.
But maybe also it isn't unfair. Maybe it's, I mean, it's unfair in terms of how difficult it is to make money today.

That's part of the unfairness of the system that we're living in in 2025.

But I actually don't find it unfair that the man needs to demonstrate an ability to present some economic viability and ability to provide. I think that that's actually

kind of great because

it also inspires you as a man. to get your shit together and to work really hard.
And

that's the piece of of it that I'm like,

you know, that this might actually be a good thing. And, you know, you met, you, you referenced the idea that the guy who's, you know, enrolling in vocational training, he's coming up with a plan.

He's figuring out how he's going to make some money and figuring out his savings plan.

I

think that that guy, I would bet, maybe I'm wrong, but I would bet that that guy is more attractive to most women, at least very, a lot of women, than the guy who

made a million bucks on crypto because he got lucky and

you know

rents Lamborghinis in his spare time.

I would argue that women, a woman would be more attracted to the guy who demonstrated the maturity that it takes to actually build wealth in a real way versus the guy who just ran into some money.

And I feel like that's something that

young people don't understand.

And it's leading men into very weird and bad places where we think that if we to get the, to get the girl,

screw vocational training. They don't care about guys who make, you know, $75,000, $80,000 a year.
I need to be making, I need to run into a million dollars. So how am I going to get there?

And I wonder if that's not even what is attractive. Yeah, the solid guy who's making a good living and is a kind person and built, did it on his own through his discipline and his hard work

and is in good shape and is a nice man and demonstrates kindness and has good relationship with his parents and is patriotic.

I think that guy's just fine and he's going to attract a high caliber mate. I do think that.

In cities like New York, London, or L.A., it's a little bit different because you just need to make so much money to just even live there. But what you said about,

you know, maybe it's a good thing that men are inspired to be economically successful. I think it's good to a point.

And that is, I just think men, I think a little bit of pressure, a lot of pressure on men to be economically viable is probably a good thing. You need to get your shit together.
Okay.

You're not graduating from college. All right.
What are you going to do? You're going to do an apprenticeship program? What are you going to do? Like that pressure is probably a good thing.

And the basis of capitalism is people feel a lot of incentives. which is Latin for pressure on the upside and the downside to be successful and work hard and figure shit out and try and make it work.

The problem is, I think the pressure has become, the pressure and the expectations have become totally irrational.

And that is everyone is vomiting their faux wealth on me all day long. It feels like everybody else is making a shit ton of money but me.
So I have a lack of self-esteem. And because of poor

Poor government policies and economic policies, we have let inflation run amok. We've let education skyrocket in costs.
We've made it it nearly impossible for new entrants into the housing market.

And we've just set up a younger generation of people to feel really bad about themselves on an economic level, which disproportionately impacts the self-esteem of young men.

I think these conversations, they're fun and they're interesting because they get at the heart of what it means to be a person.

I think that's why these, I mean, it's so triggering and it gets, it generates so much heat because,

I don't know, it gets at what it means to love and to be loved, how to be

understood, appreciated as a person, how to be a member of society. Like it gets to all of the deep stuff.

But it's so true that there is a vision of masculinity that some people believe is really great, like Trump, like Elon. And it is a direction that we might actually be headed in.

Nick Fuenes would be another example.

So

you are kind of spearheading the other side of it.

For someone who is really shaping a generation of men and what it means to be a man,

if you could just summarize

what do you want them to walk away with? What do you want them to walk away with from this conversation? What should be the takeaway? It's a generous question.

And there's sort of two things popped into my mind. And that is a really valuable piece of feedback I've gotten.
I've received from the book is that,

all right, protector, provider, procreator, aren't women also protectors? Like, isn't that a key component of femininity?

And it's true. And now that women are making more money as they should, can't they also be providers? Yeah, there's nuance to each, right?

Different forms of protection and providing and procreating and who's the initiator. You know, there's different forms of it.

But where I think I'm evolving to on this is that masculinity and femininity all overlap around just trying to be a better human.

That

to be a better man in many ways is just to try and be a better human.

And that maybe where I maybe made a mistake here is trying to define stark lines, lines between people born as males or females. And I do think there is differences.

I think there's predisposed behaviors we're more prone to,

but maybe it's not trying to form, I'd like to think of an aspirational form of masculinity and femininity have this huge overlap around just being

just humanity, just being better, better humans. But to your question of what would the one takeaway around

what I've written about, trying to establish an aspirational form of masculinity, it comes down to this

notion that Richard Reeves taught me, and that is surplus value. A lot of people, a lot of males go their whole life and never become men.
They die having never become men.

And in my view, the metric is not a religious ceremony or age or experiences or money. It's this term surplus value.
And that is, do you create more economic value and tax revenue than you absorb?

Every day you leave the house, you're getting, you're absorbing hundreds of dollars of other people's taxpayer money if you expect to go on the roads or expect someone to answer if you call for an ambulance.

Are you creating more economic value? That's one way to add surplus value. Are you absorbing more complaints than you're giving?

Are you the kind of person that people come to and want guidance, want comfort? Are you providing more comfort than has been given to you?

Are you providing more love and more care for other people that have been provided for you? Do you notice people's lives?

Do you have the ability to really see people where they are?

understand them and then add value to their lives, even if maybe they're not noticing or as many people aren't noticing your life. Are you a better father to your son than your father was to you?

Once you are adding surplus value, that's where you become a man. I think that's a good place to end, but I want to ask another question.
When do you think that you became a man?

You said that some people go through their whole lives and they never become a man. Was there a moment for you where you realized,

I think I'm a man now?

I never thought, okay, now, and you know, now I'm a man with some Cat Stevens song in the back.

It's very passe, but it comes down to the two big moments for me where I think I started to kind of slip into manhood were one when

my mom got sick, just trying, recognizing I needed to step up and I need to take care of my mom. And again, a lot of it came back to economics for me.
I think I've told you the story.

My mom got very sick.

I couldn't afford to get her a nurse. It was just very humiliating and upsetting for me.

And I got very serious about getting my shit together such that I could take care of my mom because she had always taken care of me. And I think I assumed, oh, that's just the way of the world.

People take care of me. That was a wake-up call that I needed.

And then not when I had kids, but a few years after when I realized, okay.

You're not going to have fabulous brunch with amazing hot people this weekend because you're taking care of your kids and they're awful and they're selfish and they're assholes, but that's what this whole shooting match is about is you're there to go to to the seventh circle of hell called a birthday party for two-year-olds and see all the other dads finally giving their wives an afternoon off.

But like thinking, okay, for the first time in my life with kids, I've thought

their well-being and success is more important than my well-being and success. And that was such an alien feeling.
Yeah. And I've leaned into that around some of my other relationships.

And I think that is a pretty decent litmus test for what it means to be a man.

This episode was produced by Claire Miller and engineered by Benjamin Spencer.

Our associate producer is Alison Weiss, Mir Silverio is our research leader, research associates are Isabella Kinsel, Dan Shalon, and Kristen O'Donoghue.

Drew Burrows is our technical director, and Catherine Dylan is our executive producer. Thank you for listening to Profit Markets from Profit Media.
Tune in tomorrow for a fresh take on the markets.

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