Forget Mr Darcy — modern women are more likely to settle for his underpaid manservant.
For the first time in history, more brides are “marrying down” than “marrying up”, according to a study by UK think tank the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR).
IPPR studied marriage figures from the past 40 years and found that — unlike Pride and Prejudice’s Elizabeth Bennet, who only returned Mr Darcy’s love when she saw the size of his house — women are now more likely to marry men from a lower social class than themselves.
In 1958, 38 percent of women married “above themselves”, while just 23% “married down”.
In the latest generation — those born between 1976 and 1981 — the trend had reversed, with just 16 percent “marrying up”, while 28 percent “married down”.
The percentage of people marrying into the same class also dramatically increased — from 39 percent in 1958 to 56 percent today.
IPPR spokesman Richard Darlington says the results reflect the changing positions of females in the workplace, from lowly-paid junior staff to successful and well-educated career women.
“In the 1960s, women working in highly segregated offices in junior clerical roles fell in love with men in senior positions and ‘married the boss’,” Darlington says.
“By the 1970s and 1980s, women had moved into more senior positions themselves and were marrying men in similar professional categories. By the 1990s, the toy boy phenomenon was at its height and by the noughties age was no longer a social taboo.
“Women are still marrying older men from the same social class as themselves, but for the first time, the proportion marrying down is higher than the proportion marrying up.”
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