Downplaying Themselves, Upholding Men’s Status: Women’s Deference to Men in Wealthy Families

Abstract

Studies often portray status as a position, but status is also a process sustained by social and cultural mechanisms. These social processes can create inequality in men’s and women’s economic positions. Families are key economic institutions, but the processes involved in managing family wealth are poorly understood. Drawing on in-depth interviews with twenty-five women (and eleven husbands) in families with a median net worth of $27.5 million, I find that wives report general ignorance about wealth (although, on deeper probing, women often have more expertise than it appears on first glance). Second, women state they are disengaged with the economic realm. Third, the formation of marriages where women would have vastly more economic power than their future husbands are deeply stigmatized. Despite formidable wealth, in these marriages, women emphasized their lack of economic expertise and engagement. This gender “stickiness” contributed to status inequality in the economic sphere.