Sunday, April 18, 2010
Taking a husband’s name comes at a price for married women. Dutch researchers have determined wives who change their name can wind up making less money—$1,162 a month—because of cultural perceptions in comparison to women who keep their pre-marriage name. That comes to more than $488,000 over a lifetime of work.
A woman who adopts their husband’s name is likely to be judged as more caring, but also as less intelligent, more emotional, less competent, and less ambitious in comparison with a woman who kept her own name, according to the researchers in their paper.
-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky
What’s in a Name? 361.708 euros: The effects of Marital Name Change (by Marret K. Noordewier, Femke van Horen, Kirsten I. Ruys and Diederik A. Stapel, Tilburg Institute for Behavioral Economics Research) (pdf)
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