Girl math: is it good for girls?
I am old enough to be desensitized to the FOMO of not being on TikTok, so I hadn’t heard of “girl math” until recently. Once I did though, I knew I had to write about it, as this viral term lies at the fascinating juncture between two of my favorite things: personal style and personal finance.
For those of you who, like me, still live under a rock, “girl math” is a tongue-in-cheek descriptor for spending priorities typically attributed to women. Like: if you return an item for a refund, you’ve made money; if you already had money on your Starbucks card, your coffee was free; anything under $5 is practically free; paying with cash doesn’t count because your bank balance didn’t go down; if you return a full-priced item to repurchase during a sale, you made money, and so on.
Basically, girl math is the new given name of a type of logic women stereotypically use to rationalize their spending habits even though it doesn’t make mathematical sense.
In the words of the ultimate girl math icon Carrie Bradshaw, I couldn’t help but wonder… Is girl math liberatingly defiant or does it reek of internalized misogyny? Should we even take it seriously or is it just meant as a joke (if anything ever is)? I decided to give all this some thought.
The positives of girl math
In the world of money, where cranky old men freely spew around shame in the form of financial advice and everything smells more bro-y than the weight room at your gym, girl math provides the much needed breath of fresh air.
Women unashamedly embracing their own real world purchasing decisions is a carefree and joyous “f*ck you” to the moldy common sense that deems our spending frivolous, to the boomer guy that pesters us about lattes and avocado toasts while sporting a $6,000 custom made Tom Ford suit (looking at you Kevin O’Leary), and to the random mansplainer that takes it upon himself to pontificate on the issue while driving a $80,000 Chevy Silverado. No thank you, we shall no longer have our preferences devalued.
Besides, any good financial expert would know that money is more psychology than math. Girl math may not add up mathematically, but it reminds us that money is most valuable when it’s a vehicle to get us something much more important than itself, like time, convenience, and joy. An oat milk latte, exorbitantly priced at $9, can provide the best kind of therapy if consumed in a nice cafe with a dear friend, a $300 pair of heels can be the greatest purchase ever if it makes you feel like the most powerful person at the office, a $200 wireless earbuds can be the best return on investment if it makes your morning commute fun and educational.
I personally girl-mathed plenty in my day: I once purchased a $400 handbag with my $1100 per month graduate student salary. I wore it at least 2,000 times over the years (that’s 20 cents per wear if you really want some math), and it gave me immense joy every time I did. It was well worth eating ramen dinners for the rest of that month, which my 24-year-old body didn’t mind at all. (Hashtag, the girls that get it get it.) Another time, I had a $60 dinner with my best friend when we both had less than $200 in our accounts combined, and ended up having a wonderful time. The money came back, but that joyful moment wouldn’t have.
This is especially important because the ever-worsening systemic issues of late capitalism wants us to constantly hustle, struggle, and suffer while the financial bar for a decent life seems to keep getting prohibitingly high for most of us. Housing prices and the cost of basic necessities keep climbing as the Dave Ramseys of the world are busy telling everyone in debt that “they don’t deserve to see the inside of a restaurant unless they work there.” This level of inhospitality is simply too much.
Annabel Curran, the writer of this article at the Michigan Daily said it best: “Girl math and the fun, carefree enjoyment that comes with it is a beacon of hope for every overworked and underpaid individual in our current capitalist system, a reminder that it is OK to put yourself first and invest not only in houses and retirement savings but in personal happiness — however temporary.”
Girls are done apologizing for what makes them happy. Sorry, not sorry.
The negatives of girl math
And yet, girl math takes a darker turn when paired with the fact that women have historically had limited access to financial know-how, and continue to do so to a large extent.
Sure, I happily spent all that money on things that made me happy, but when not paired with adequate knowledge about how to manage the rest of what I had, this eventually came back to bite me in the derriere. When I had to take a job I didn’t like in a city where I didn’t know anybody, I came to the sobering realization that I was stuck in this depressing state largely because of my lack of knowledge about how money works. Simply put, I didn’t have options because I didn’t have money.
Notice that I said my lack of access to information was the culprit, not the expensive handbag I purchased. I spent my twenties in academia, where they teach you Kant’s moral theory but not index funds or high yield savings accounts. I was encouraged to think that my work was a “labor of love” and accept my laughably low paycheck because that wasn’t the important part. I thought saving money, increasing your income and investing were for money-drunk rich men who didn’t care about anything but that. Needless to say, I have been tragically deceived.
Women’s lack of access to financial resources in the United States has a history that’s disturbingly recent. It was only in 1974 that the U.S. passed the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, allowing women to have a bank account, a credit card, or a loan without their husband’s approval. This means that people who were born when American women were finally deemed intelligent enough to manage their own finances are only 50 years old right now.
As you pick your jaw back up and try to process this grotesque insult, let me also tell you that we haven’t really progressed a whole lot from that initial point since then. Despite the proliferation of refreshing new voices in the personal finance arena, like Katie Gatti Tassin from Money with Katie, Tori Dunlap from Her First 100K, Simran Kaur from Girls That Invest, and many others like them, the idea that women just aren’t good with money is still well and alive. The fact remains that we need a more concerted effort to make financial education available and accessible to all, while also working to dismantle harmful stereotypes that gate-keep certain demographics from building financial safety (and wealth) for themselves.
Looping back to girl math under this light, one might wonder: is it too soon to make jokes about women’s financial aptitude? Could this playful endorsement of our own (silly little) priorities be taking the much needed airtime away from issues like gender pay gap, the penalization of motherhood, and the plethora of other financial issues that affect women? Is this too much depth to expect from a TikTok trend? Possibly, possibly, and possibly.
The sum total
Living a joyful life while also creating wealth in order to give yourself enough options is a tall order to everyone, and women have serious historical disadvantages that makes it even harder. Given this context, girl math provides a useful (and easily popularized) framework to help us embrace our own choices in a world where our purchasing decisions are constantly criticized. In that, it can be a tool of defiance.
But then I get skeptical again when I think about the painful symbolism of how Carrie Bradshaw (the Gen X’er girl math champion from above) and her expensive Manolo Blahniks lived only a short distance from the Wall Street’s charging bull and its testicles, while nobody ever said anything about how she could afford to rent an apartment in Manhattan filled with designer clothes on a writer’s salary. Are we really past this unrealistic narrative upheld by the popular media almost two decades ago? Or is girl math its grandchild that continues to put the emphasis on consumerism rather than wealth building when it comes to women’s money?
I am afraid I still don’t have a resounding answer. On the one hand, walking the line between defiance and self-mockery, girl math could be one way to say, “Hey! We will proudly get our lattes, eat our avocado toasts, and buy our designer bags. We are here and our preferences matter.” After all, we are now in an era when a Taylor Swift ticket is just as socially acceptable a purchase as a Super Bowl ticket. On the other hand, I also think we can own our decisions without declaring ourselves amusingly inept, especially when we know that women are better savers and investors despite getting the short end of the historical stick.
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