No Money, No Honey — Hypergamy

“No Money, No Honey” — The old proverbial that all men must come to learn if they want to attract a female companion into their lives. “No money, no honey” isn’t just some phrase created by Western culture; rather, it’s wisdom universal to all men from all corners of the globe.

To understand exactly what “no money, no honey” means, it’s important first to address the female mating strategy. The female mating strategy is the most sophisticated yet straightforward one known in the human mating sphere. It’s analogous to putting two men in a cage and letting them battle it out to the death. Whoever wins is the one who gets picked as a mate — “may the best man win”. It seems very primitive, but this analogy illustrates one of the most important processes known to humankind.

Because females are responsible for propagating society, they have adopted mating strategies throughout our evolutionary past that are highly effective and highly receptive to good male genetics.

It’s been found cross-culturally that women select men either equal to or higher in socioeconomic status — this is called hypergamy. The evolutionary goal of hypergamy is to seek the most competent male mate possible to ensure that resources and protection are provided during pregnancy and child-rearing.

While the modern-day woman most likely creates her own pool of resources through employment, research into female attraction shows that hypergamy is still working behind the scenes today. Evolutionary psychologist, David Buss, found that intelligence and ambition are the two most attractive traits women find in men. Both intelligence and ambition are good indicators of male competence.

So, despite the social, industrial and technological change, women remain biologically and psychologically hardwired to seek out the most competent man they can find.

Therefore, the “no money, no honey” line still carries much weight when men talk about attracting a female companion. In modern-day, less formal terms — before a man can think of attracting a female into his life for a serious relationship, he must get his shit together; otherwise, there won’t be any honey waiting for him.