Chapter 1: What is 'Girl Math' and how does it relate to financial freedom?
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At a certain point, we have to hold ourselves accountable as women and say, it's barely been 50 years that we can even have a credit card, that we can own property, that we can do things in our own name to...
be so eager to give up all of that and to go back into this place of voluntary helplessness and voluntary ignorance in service of a very specific kind of love to me is we just can't allow ourselves to do that.
Chapter 2: How do societal narratives shape women's financial fantasies?
Girl math. I'm just a girl and living a soft life. Aren't just fun trends. They're financial fantasies. Chelsea Fagan, author and CEO of The Financial Diet, joins the show to unpack how our romantic pursuits, romance novels, and even the way we think about aging are all wrapped up in our insecurities surrounding class. Chelsea, welcome to It's Been a Minute.
Chapter 3: What financial assumptions do women make about relationships?
Hi, thank you for having me. This is so exciting.
Hello, hello. I'm Brittany Luce, and you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR, a show about what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by accident. Listen, I'm excited. I'm excited.
Chapter 4: How do class fantasies influence modern romance narratives?
I have been getting all types of advice from you and your guests for a very long time. Sometimes I hear some of their voices in the back of my head. I want to make an unwise purchase. And it thwarts me. So I'm grateful for that. So I'm very excited to have you here today.
Chapter 5: What lessons can women learn from older generations about financial independence?
But I want to talk today not so much about financial advice, but financial fantasies. Because I feel like... I don't know. Sometimes I feel like the lifeblood of the internet is financial fantasy. So I want to start by asking you, what is the number one like financial fantasy brain rot that we have all been ingrained to think is reasonable that you see floating around the internet?
Oh, well, I mean, for women, it's definitely the idea that being entirely reliant on a man is aspirational.
Chapter 6: How can women protect their financial futures in relationships?
That's a big one. Um, And also, I think there's a real resurgence of this really delusional class fantasy for women that a wealthy man will kind of pluck you out of obscurity and give you this really, really fabulous life. And what's ironic about that, to be clear, people have generally always married within their social class.
But what's even funnier about it now is that years ago, very rich men wanted a stay-at-home wife and mother. Now, the very rich lawyer wants another lawyer.
Chapter 7: What are the risks of relying solely on a partner for financial security?
The very rich doctor wants another doctor. What's better than one income? Exactly.
Exactly.
But it's a level of stratification of class that is on so many more along so many more axes than it ever was before. It's like if you're a lower income woman, not only are you probably not going to marry a wealthy man because of the class difference, but also because he's likely looking for a woman who is extremely educated in similar circles, works a very similar job.
Chapter 8: How do societal expectations impact women's financial decisions?
and essentially brings as much to the table as he does in terms of status, in terms of income, which, by the way, doesn't work out super well even for the women who are in these marriages. There are tons of memoirs about that. Yeah. But I think it's a real fantasy that I see a lot more on social media now.
We will definitely be getting into that. It's interesting, too, that you bring that up because it feels... The other sort of, like, very, I think, like... Dude-focused financial fantasy that I see floating around does not really support this class fantasy that many women are investing in. The one I see floating around for dudes I think is just complete brain rot is just the idea that...
sports betting, like online sports gambling is a great side hustle. That feels like a big fantasy. That feels like a big fantasy. But I want to circle back to something that you touched on, which is the idea that there are already women who have lived the reality of end of this fantasy idea that a man can take care of you.
I mean, really what that's about is like learning from the people that came before you and kind of absorbing their financial wisdom and their financial lessons from these hard won life lessons that they've, you know, come into. It makes me think about You're Just Getting Good videos. I love them, where you specifically interview women over 50 about their financial lives. So good. So good.
There are so many lessons in there, but I love it because it gives us a look at many women's financial realities as opposed to kind of like the projections that we see a lot of online. Very often the women that you interview are single or happily divorced or just simply living life on their own terms. And they're very happy about it.
What made you start this series and what were you hoping your audience would gain from it?
Well, several years ago, I made the choice to only really follow women over 50 on social media outside of women that I actually know, obviously. But in terms of like influencers, creators, things like that.
Um, mostly because I think that if we don't really go out of our way to seek that out, the, um, especially social media really just kind of redounds to this extremely youth oriented view of life. Um, and I think that ageism and sort of self, um, self loathing around age for, for women, especially is... Something that you it's a current that you have to actively swim against.
And I do think that for as you know, certainly we're far from perfect, but I think as much as we may have advanced in other ways over the past 20 plus years, 30 years, maybe. on having more progressive and inclusive ideas of beauty and worth and value and attractiveness and sexuality and all of those things.
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