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A simple theory of where the women are beautiful
For a few weeks twice a year, after Ramadan and before Christmas, thousands of Lebanon’s young men return from jobs abroad — and run smack into one of the world’s most aggressive cultures of female display. Young women of means have spent weeks primping and planning how to sift through as many men as possible in the short time available. The austere month of Ramadan ended a week ago.
The country’s high rate of unemployment pushes the young men to seek work elsewhere, sometimes in Western countries like France and Canada, but mainly in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the other oil states on the Persian Gulf. The women, inhibited by family pressures, are generally left behind.
MR readers will not be shocked to learn these women strongly prefer the Lebanese men with foreign jobs and foreign incomes; here is the full story of competition and rent exhaustion.
My simple theory of where the women are attractive has two variables: income inequality, and the willingness of wealthier men to marry beautiful women from the lower income and social classes. Women then compete for lucrative marriage prizes. That puts Cuba (the wealthy men are the tourists) and Brazil near the top of the list, where they belong. New York City isn't bad, and this mechanism won't hurt China either.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on November 5, 2006 at 06:37 AM in Economics | Permalink
Comments
In the mid-80s, when I was in my early 20s, I worked for an oil exploration company that was doing offshore seismic surveying in Nigeria. My job required that I work outside under the equatorial sun pretty much all day long. The ABs we had working for us were Filipinos, who worked on longterm contracts (9 months at a stretch).
I would work all day in a Speedo, trying to get as dark as possible. Therefore when I went on break in Europe, I had a beautiful dark tan (and completely bleached hair).
The Filipinos, on the other hand, wore long track pants, long sleeve Tshirts, and wrapped another long-sleeve Tshirt around their faces so that only their eyes were visible. I asked them why they wore this hot outfit.
The told me that their salaries for working as ABs were very good by Filipino standards, and even better given that they could not really spend any of the money while they were on board ship for 9 months (in other words, room and board was free). So when they went home, they had lots of cash to spend on the ladies--but they didn't want to have the dark tans that women would associate with manual laborers. They wanted to look like pale, prosperous office workers. Having money was important, but being pale was an important signal that said to women, "I have money."
On reflection, my tan served the same purpose--instantly signalling to women that I had plenty of leisure time, and therefore probably had decent money.
Posted by: RWB at Nov 5, 2006 9:17:00 AM
Tyler,
aren't you (deliberately?) omitting the obvious example of the country your wife comes from (mine too)?
Moscow (and more or less any other Russian city, although Moscow more so) immediately springs to mind as an example of a place with extremes of wealth, most of the money being new or foreign, and eye-wateringly beautiful women everywhere you look.
In that particular case, I recently saw somebody - can't remember who - attribute it to the country having a long history of foreign conquests, where the conquerors leave hardly anybody alive except beautiful women.
Which would however not obviously apply to New York, at least not in the last three hundred years or so.
Posted by: Alan Little at Nov 5, 2006 11:07:28 AM
But? But? But? I thought women were attracted to the funny, sensitive guys!
(Funny sensitive guys the world over busting a gut laughing. Have you ever seen a really good looking guy with a nice car lonely no matter what a dick he is? Or any guy with a really fat wallet not having plenty of company no matter how old or homely he might be? Maybe money can't buy happiness, maybe it can't buy you love, but it can sure as hell make sure you are not sitting by yourself on the barstool at closing time.)
Posted by: Bruce Webb at Nov 5, 2006 11:10:54 AM
Tyler,
With all due respect all your post confirms is that Lebanon's a dump. Who cares how elaborate its mating rituals are when it can't create jobs?
Posted by: Martin at Nov 5, 2006 12:05:08 PM
Iceland, home of the most beautiful women in the world (just ask the Ford Agency) doesn't fit the model (no pun intended).
Posted by: Jake at Nov 5, 2006 12:06:50 PM
Since a couple of weeks I know (from firsthand experience - pun intended!) that the most beautiful woman lives in Slowakia. Yes, woman, no spelling error.. Since I don't have a tan nor money at the moment you guys still stand a chance ;)
Posted by: Niels at Nov 5, 2006 1:19:34 PM
What makes China different from many other countries is that for every 100 girls born, there are 121 boys waiting in line. Women could afford to slack on their looks just a bit.
Posted by: Yan Li at Nov 5, 2006 1:40:21 PM
All indications are that my daughter, a US citizen, will be tall, blonde, athletic, slim and ... smart. By most measures I should be thrilled because it looks like she won some kind of genetic lottery; Why does this discussion depress me?
Posted by: mike at Nov 5, 2006 1:59:34 PM
Yan Li,
That ratio probably doesn't matter as much as you think. Yes, there are 121 boys for every 100 girls. But the 100 girls are competing with one another to be the most attractive in order to attract the best mate among those 121 boys. Unless the collude (unlikely), they'll be as concerned about their looks as the rest of us.
Posted by: Don at Nov 5, 2006 4:25:42 PM
Nature and nurture both play a role in selecting for good looks, with nature playing a long term role and nurture a short term role.
Tropical agricultural societies where the women do most of the work of feeding themselves and their children will tend to be highly polygamous, with some particularly attractive men marrying dozens or even hundreds of women. Since women do most of the providing, they get a big say in who they will marry. So, they tend to select for handsome, visibly muscular men who are good athletes, singers, dancers, and talkers. Over time, the culture develops more of them for genetic and cultural reasons.
In contrast, cold-weather societies where women need a hard-working husband to help them and their children survive the hungry months of winter, will tend to be monogamous. This culture will select for attractive women, but also men who are hard-working but not a lot of fun.
However, recent economic changes can change the nurture environment. Now that nobody starves in Scandinavia and the welfare state enforces a high degree of economic equality, women don't have to invest as much effort in their looks, since marrying a hard-working man is not a life-or-death proposition like it was as recently as the hungry 19th century. Hence, the often noticed tendency of Scandinavian natural beauties to make much less of an effort to look good than women in less equal countries.
Posted by: Steve Sailer at Nov 5, 2006 6:26:52 PM
Mike, in case your question wasn't rhetorical, I suspect it's because this sort of discussion is exceedingly impersonal--there's no hint that people might match up because they like or love each other.
Posted by: Nancy Lebovitz at Nov 5, 2006 8:21:21 PM
I don't get it; primping and planning doesn't make anyone more attractive.
Posted by: Paul N at Nov 5, 2006 9:16:22 PM
Iceland? I have spent some time in Iceland and I wasn't particularly impressed by the women. The women in Sweden, France, and Italy (in no order) came off better.
The women are not mostly blonde, at least in my observations. The prettiest girl I saw was a brunette at a movie theatre.
Of course, I spent almost all of my time in very, very remote rural parts of Iceland and virtually none in upscale urban areas.
I should say that Iceland itself is stunningly beautiful and visiting is highly recommended. Note that to appreciate Iceland you do need to be interested in hiking, climbing, volcanoes, waterfalls, glaciers, etc. Spending a day or two around Reykjavik (Blue Lagoon, the Geyser) does not do justice to the place.
No one should attach too much credence to my comments about Icelandic women… Too much potential selection bias and possible random variation. However, I have more than enough data points to be confident about the beauty of the place.
Posted by: Peter Schaeffer at Nov 6, 2006 12:10:14 AM
Even in South Africa where we have a big racial divide pale skin is always preferred to darker skin. When you look at the extent with which black women use cosmetics to lighten their facial appearance that's a sign. And its always, especially since our first democratic elections in 1994 been in vogue for a black men to date a white women. All you have to do is look at some of the most prominent politicians, some who are now in private sector or those powerful ones who remain in politics. Many of them have white women as wives and that seems to imply "I've arrived." The whole notion of "lobola", an African custom, where the groom pays (in the old days with cows) bride's family to get married to their daughter, its clear that money follows the beautiful young women and vice versa.
Posted by: Ramon Thomas at Nov 6, 2006 1:28:35 AM
Anthropologist Peter Frost has put forward a persuasive theory for why fairer-skinned females are preferred in almost all cultures, and were favored even before European contact:
http://www.vdare.com/sailer/050612_blondes.htm
Posted by: Steve Sailer at Nov 6, 2006 4:16:31 AM
In a letter to the editor in the Feb 1996 issue of Scientific American, Professor V. S. Ramachandran (University of California at San Diego) writes:
"I would like to propose an evolutionary explanation for 'why gentlemen prefer blondes' over brunettes in Western culture. Several authors have suggested that florid displays of secondary sexual characteristics 'inform' the female that the suitor is healthy and free of dermal parasites. I suggest that being blonde serves a similar purpose. Anemia (a common symptom of intestinal parasites), cyanosis, jaundice and skin infection are much easier to detect in fair-skinned individuals than in brunettes. Also, the skin of blondes 'ages' faster and more visibly than that of brunettes. Fertility in women declines with age and with disease, so men may gravitate toward blondes, in whom such signs are easier to observe. I originally intended the above as a parody of ad hoc sociobiological theorize of human mate selection but came to realize that this idea is at least as viable as many others currently in vogue, including those mentioned by Horgan (See the article by John Horgan, "The New Social Darwinists," Scientific American, October 1995)".
Posted by: Venkat at Nov 6, 2006 7:27:15 AM
Here in the UAE, the suntan lotion (for the westerners) is right beside the skin bleaching cream (for the Arabs and Indians) on the drugstore shelves.
Posted by: bartman at Nov 6, 2006 8:21:00 AM
Re Venkat's comments --
Blonde 'skin' doesn't age more visibly than brunette 'skin,' fair skin ages more obviously than olive skin. And if you are looking at current US beauty standards, very pale women are generally not as desirable as ones who are fair but tan well. Bartman makes the point that desired skin shade is relative, and serves as a proxy for something else (status, wealth, etc.)
Posted by: Georgiana at Nov 6, 2006 10:39:46 AM
There are sex differences in skin color. Women really are "the fair sex" by about 10%. That was clearly visible to medieval Europeans, but it was forgotten, at the conscious level, when society became multiracial, which swamped sex differences in skin color.
However, that helps explain why almost all love scenes in Hollywood movies feature a woman whose skin tone is at least as fair as the man. A fair skin is subconsciously seen as a feminine secondary sexual characteristic. Indeed, that helps explain why Nicole Kidman works so much -- it's impossible to match her with a fairer leading man. Strikingly, she is often paired with leading men who are substantially shorter than her, such as her ex-husband Tom Cruise, but height is less important these days in casting romantic leads than skin tone.
Posted by: Steve Sailer at Nov 6, 2006 12:53:30 PM
I always thought gentlemen preferred blondes because blonde hair/blue eyes/pale skin indicates something to the effect of:
"Hey, look at all my recessive traits! Your genes will find a nice home here!"
Posted by: Xmas at Nov 6, 2006 1:54:08 PM
The most beautiful are the Nubians of southern Egypt. To my western eye they are stunning - both the women and the men.
I asked one local about all the *western* women dressed up to the nines and sitting alone in the street coffee shops. He said that they have come from the west
looking to marry a Nubian man (rolling his eyes as he spoke in an 'As If' kind of way). I understood him - the western women may have been comparatively rich but were plain compared to the Nubian women.
Posted by: Stephen at Nov 6, 2006 11:20:22 PM
Thought i'd better put in my 2 cents.......been to about 14 countries all over the world. To this date, shentzen, china had the most beautiful, i mean hottest women i've ever seen. beats new york, london, rio, paris, los angeles (ie. the other places i've been). but funny how its not all that well known so consider yourself better educated. i must admit though i've never been to iceland and not sure its just one of those myths that got out of hand but wondering if anybody who's been there can elaborate.
Posted by: Ben at Nov 26, 2006 1:22:37 AM
I was amazed at the all the beautiful women when i visited Denmark :)
Posted by: Seb at Jan 9, 2007 8:26:00 PM
I was amazed at the all the beautiful women when i visited Denmark :)
Posted by: Seb at Jan 9, 2007 8:26:02 PM
I'm shocked at all the stereotyping, prejudice, and ignorance I've encountered in many of those replies. What is it that makes the color of the skin, being it pale or whatever, a "superior" trait of beauty in a woman? This is so ethnocentric and clichéd, because living in Europe(all you have inside your mouths), I haven't ever seen one woman that could slightly compare to the Latin American beautiful women I've seen(it could be the mix of so many ethnicities) and anyhow, Southern Europeans and people from the Mediterranean are not exactly white.
Of course that if in South Africa, in a continent where most people are black, paler skin is preferred, it's quite obvious and logical to assume that people will always be attracted to what sticks out of the masses, what is different to them, which doesn't mean white skin is objectively" more beautiful or not" (that's what national socialists in the middle of the last century thought and had some "whitening" policies ;) ).
Scandinavian women? I guess one finds beautiful women all over the world, from Canada to Tierra del Fuego, to Egypt, China, simply everywhere, also beauty as anything, is relative.
Posted by: amazed at Jan 19, 2007 11:01:37 AM
