Hear someone say gold digger and you’ll no doubt picture a young, attractive woman intent on bagging a wealthy man.
But according to the authors of a new book, this stereotype is not only unfair, it is utterly inaccurate.
They say most gold diggers are not young single women – but married men.
Through their work as co-founders of the global financial platform Female Invest, Camilla Falkenberg, Emma Due Bitz and Anna-Sophie Hartvigsen have helped teach hundreds of thousands of women how to invest their money in stocks and shares and build their own wealth, just as men have done traditionally.
In doing so, they’ve encountered many intelligent, successful women married to men who use their union – whether consciously or not – for their own financial benefit. As they write in their book, It’s A Rich Man’s World: ‘These women’s stories reveal the truth – that the real gold diggers aren’t women who marry rich.
‘They’re the men who expect their wife (or long-term female partner) to work full-time, clean the house, raise the kids, carry the mental load and split the bills 50/50.’
Not that these men are actively taking money from their wives – after all, they mostly have their own careers. But the trio insist: ‘The married men who benefit from this unpaid labour at home wouldn’t achieve as much at work without their wives or female partners. They wouldn’t be able to thrive professionally, increase their earnings or pursue that big promotion.
‘Seeing such a dynamic so consistently can only then make you wonder: who’s really benefiting from marriage?
‘Because if a man relies on his partner to work, contribute financially, manage the home and raise his children, he’s not a partner. He’s a dependant.’
The authors of It’s a Rich Man’s World say that if a man relies on his partner to work, contribute financially, manage the home and raise his children then he’s a ‘dependant’ not a partner
In short, he is a gold digger.
They give the example of one of their members, Marie, 36, who landed her dream job as a sustainability consultant at a major London bank straight out of business school. She worked hard, delivered results and was promoted twice in record time. She then married a man who worked at the same bank, in a similar role, on similar money.
By the time she left for maternity leave, aged 34, she was a manager earning the equivalent of £7,600 a month.
Her husband was no villain. But he didn’t step up – and they fell into a pattern that would prove disastrous for Marie’s personal finances. Meanwhile, his career trajectory continued unimpeded.
It started with maternity leave: Marie spent eight months at home with her baby, five of which were unpaid – worth around £40,000 in terms of her income.
Of course, she gained something priceless: time with her child. But there’s no denying it came at a cost.
‘When I returned to work, I didn’t receive the promotion I had been on track for,’ she explains. ‘But my husband was promoted and given a £1,400 a month pay rise.’
Marie also found herself lumbered with so-called ‘invisible labour’ – the unpaid domestic tasks that mean life stays on track for everyone at home, including her husband.
As well as this, she manages all the drop-offs and pick-ups to their now 18-month-old daughter’s childcare.
‘I really thought we were one of those equal modern couples, so I never thought to discuss topics like laundry, childcare and the mental load,’ she says. ‘But after taking more time off, I somehow ended up doing everything at home, which of course impacted my career negatively.’
Not only was she exhausted at home, she was exhausted at work too. She had little energy to keep climbing the corporate ladder.
This legal document outlines how your finances will be handled if the relationship ends. Hopefully, you’ll never need it but if you do, you’ll be glad it’s there
As the Female Invest founders point out: ‘She certainly can’t stay late, take on extra hours or stretch herself for those high-visibility projects that could turbo-charge her career the way some of her colleagues can.’
Or indeed, the way her husband can – thanks to her sacrifices. Marie says: ‘My partner is not a bad person and he didn’t leave me with all this work intentionally. However, I can’t help but resent him for it sometimes and despite many fights I still don’t think he fully understands.
‘It also makes me nervous for the future, because my finances have taken such a big hit. Basically, I now couldn’t afford to be a single mother even if I wanted to.’
Today, while they talk more openly about the topic, it’s hard to break the pattern as it has become so ingrained in their house. Maria still shoulders the majority of unpaid domestic labour.
As a result, Marie’s husband earns more than her, his pension is larger than hers and his career prospects are greater than hers. All, say the book’s authors, because he has been piggybacking off her domestic labours.
Neither she nor her husband stopped to think how his lack of input into their family life would decimate her earning potential. Or the fact it wouldn’t cost her husband one single penny.
Falkenberg, Due Bitz and Hartvigsen, originally from Denmark, say Marie is not alone: ‘Statistics from the Pew Research Centre reveal that married women still do the majority of unpaid domestic labour, even when they are the main breadwinner.
‘And, on average, women in the UK spend twice as much time doing housework as men, even if they are in work and their partners are unemployed.’
Of course, they say, some men are amazing partners: ‘But very few of us are encouraged to treat our choice of life partner like the financial decision it is – to ask hard questions, look past emotional chemistry and plan, not only for love, but equity.
‘We’ve seen that above all else, whatever your salary, stocks profile or mortgage rate is, the most significant financial decision a woman can make is who her husband or partner is.
It’s important to get finances right because if a marriage is one of the 50 per cent ending in divorce, it’s likely the woman won’t fare well financially
‘Not just for what they earn or save responsibly. But whether they support your ambitions without flinching; whether they assume your career will bend around theirs – and whether they will quietly opt out when the emotional labour gets inconvenient.
‘As Marie found, the wrong partner might not sabotage you outright but they’ll slowly chip away at your energy, your professional momentum and cost you dearly.’
As for the women’s own personal circumstances, they are emphatic: ‘We are not anti-men. Two of us are mothers – Emma has two children aged one and three, while Camilla has one child aged two – and all of us are in happy long-term relationships. We know how much joy a good relationship can bring.’
But, they say, they believe men can and should step up, as their partners have.
Here, they give their top tips to ensure love doesn’t come at too high a price – whether you’re about to get hitched or have been married for decades…
Choosing a husband is a financial decision
Ask basic questions before you commit: how does he handle money? At what age does he want to retire? Do you split responsibilities fairly?
It’s important to get this right because if a marriage is one of the 50 per cent ending in divorce, it’s likely the woman won’t fare well financially. Rather than ending up with half of everything he has, on average women experience a 41 per cent drop in income after divorce, nearly double the average decrease men experience.
This is because of systemic disadvantages that compound over time: career breaks to care for children and dependants, the persistent wage gap and the lack of involvement in financial planning. In the UK, divorced women retire with 75 per cent less savings than divorced men.
Do everything you can to make sure your prospective husband respects you financially as well as emotionally, before you say I do.
It’s not too late to get a ‘postnup’
If one partner will pause their career for children or take on more unpaid work, discuss how that will be recognised financially
You’ve probably heard of prenups and wondered if you need one. The short answer? Yes.
This legal document outlines how your finances will be handled if the relationship ends. Hopefully, you’ll never need it but if you do, you’ll be glad it’s there.
Every country has default rules about what happens to your money, assets and debts when a marriage ends. The question isn’t whether you want a prenup, it’s whether you want to choose your own rules or let the government decide for you.
A prenup is not about ripping off your partner or assuming your marriage will fail. It’s about sitting down while you’re both on the same team and figuring out what feels fair. Far from being ‘unromantic’, a prenup is an act of love and respect.
If you’re already married, you can still make this agreement. It’s then called a ‘postnuptial agreement’ (postnup) but is exactly the same thing.
Here’s our simple prenup guide:
Start the conversation before wedding planning takes over. Frame it as protecting both of you, not just yourself.
Decide what you want to protect: property you owned before marriage, inheritances, businesses, family money or future earnings.
If one partner will pause their career for kids or take on more unpaid work, discuss how that will be recognised financially. Will your partner recompense you for your time off work?
Hire lawyers. Both of you will need independent legal advice to make the prenup valid. Even though it costs money, it’s nothing compared to the cost of going through divorce without the right paperwork in place first.
Price up your maternity leave
If your partner is working while you are off to care for your baby, you should discuss how he will recompense you for your time, including recompensing you for your pension.
One Female Invest member told us she felt bad for ‘using’ her husband’s money while on maternity leave. But she wasn’t using his money, she was subsidising his career.
Without her doing the unpaid work at home – caring for their child, keeping the household running – he wouldn’t have been able to earn that salary in the first place.
Take Marie’s example. First, she missed out on £38,000 in salary during her five months of unpaid leave and lost pension contributions worth £3,040 (8 per cent of her salary over those five unpaid months).
Over time, that missing contribution realistically would have grown to £30,590 by the time she turns 60 – adding up to £68,590.
This doesn’t account for the potential salary increase of £1,400 per month she would have received had she got a promotion like her husband’s.
For the sake of simplicity, let’s assume Marie now gets £1,400 less than her male counterparts every month for the rest of her career; her total salary loss until retirement 30 years later is £504,000.
If she had invested this extra money and got the average market return of 8 per cent per year, this would have grown to £1,903,157. A startling sum.
Ensure you have all the passwords
One UBS study found 56 per cent of married women hand over financial decisions to their husbands. This comes with real consequences, especially considering that 80 per cent of women will die single, either due to widowhood or divorce. Most will get negative financial surprises because they weren’t involved in managing the money.
So ask your husband or partner for all the passwords to all your respective savings and accounts, make a list of where they are,and how much is in them.
Til illness do us part
Sadly, when women get seriously ill, they’re far more likely to be left by their partners than the other way round. One study found women with life-altering health conditions are six times more likely to be abandoned by their male partners than men are by their female partners.
This is because, for too many men, the emotional labour, care-giving and household responsibilities their wives have always handled suddenly falls on their shoulders. And instead of stepping up, they walk away.
In a culture that still socialises women to serve and men to receive, sickness becomes a breaking point. Not because the love dies but because the service stops.
It’s vital to have adequate private health insurance. You need that safety net of decent medical care – just in case you’re left to manage alone.
Adapted from It’s A Rich Man’s World by Camilla Falkenberg, Emma Due Bitz and Anne-Sophie Hartvigsen (Orion Ignite, £20), to be published July 9. © Camilla Falkenberg, Emma Due Bitz and Anne-Sophie Hartvigsen 2026. To order a copy for £18 (offer valid to 14/07/26; UK P&P free on orders over £25) go to mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3176 2937.
