This audio version is of limited use without any PDF accompaniments. The rating scale is difficult to score on paper, impossible when listening. And the appendix is useless in its current form. I suggest reading the paper edition instead.
If you appreciate a research backed approach to making relationship decisions, and you are looking for insights on just one specific topic, then you will appreciate this book. It’s an excellent source to reference when figuring out if you should merge bank accounts with your spouse. It also offers a good jumping off point for couples to discuss who should make which financial decisions in a marriage and why, although the recommendations are based on personal opinion instead of research or data.
The author clearly has a bias towards the benefits of spendthrifts, downplaying how catastrophic the extreme form of this trait can be for families and oddly overemphasizing how sad the life of the tightwad is, without any solid data to back that conclusion up.
There is also a glaring lack of data regarding how many people are spendthrifts, how many are tightwads, or how many people are what he defines as “unconflicted consumers” in the general population. And these mysterious people in the middle get almost no discussion at all. Imagine if a study looked at anxious/avoidant relationships in all their variations except in pairings with securely attached partners. That’s a huge blind spot in his research.
This book would benefit from a more developed discussion of how to negotiate the big financial issues that come up in a marriage and less on the readers digest style discussion of how to pick out the perfect gift for your spouse.
Oddly, the book apologizes for not having enough data to make recommendations to homosexual couples (only 1% of the US population) while virtually ignoring stepfamilies (who make up as much as 40% of couples with children), who struggle with incredibly complex financial issues.
Overall, this book feels like an undergraduate research project mishmashed with a couple of pop psychology articles and intended to convince his wife to let him buy the kids a pair of Nikes so they will have friends.
It’s a shame. There is potential here and a better editor would have addressed these flaws long before publication. I hope Rick writes a much better follow up.
I listened to his interview on the Reimagining Love podcast and really enjoyed learning about his research. I suggest you just listen to that and count yourself lucky to have saved a few hours of your time.