Attitude to Money in the UK
Research conducted in Great Britain by Vogler and Pahl (1999:133) identified five basic systems of financial management in marriages:
1. The whole wage system, whereby either the man hands over his wage and the wife is responsible for all the finances of the household or the husband has sole responsibility for managing all household finances.
2. The allowance system, whereby the man gives the wife a housekeeping allowance and pays other bills himself.
3. The shared management (a common pool), whereby both have access to income and expenditure comes from a shared pool (although the pool may be managed jointly or by one of the partners).
4. The shared management (a partial pool), whereby personal spending money comes from funds retained by each partner.
5. The independent management system, whereby each partner has separate responsibilities and neither partner has access to all funds.
The first and second systems are characteristics of male-breadwinner family patterns and are less represented in Britain. Women typically managed the money in low-income households and this situation was seen as a chore by women, rather than a source of power. In households with higher incomes or in families where women were economically inactive, husbands were likely to control finances; typically, wives were given a housekeeping allowance. The higher the income levels, the greater the equality of sharing, state Vogler and Pahl (1999:131). According to Bacs Consumer Payments Survey 2008, Britons are wealthier in terms of income levels then ever before. However, they are becoming more cautious about how they spend their money (Bacs Consumer Payments Survey 2008). Three quarters of respondents said they pride themselves on being careful with money. An almost equal number – 72% – said they did not agree that they often found themselves over-committed financially. And more than nine out of ten respondents said that they liked to know where they stood financially, while 87% agreed they usually knew how much they had in their current account (Bacs Consumer Payments Survey 2006 – 2007).
Younger couples from the UK in Vogler and Pahl’s research, operated on mixed financial systems which often involved a number of different accounts. One-fifth of those interviewed were operating on a joint pool system. Most couples, though, proved to have separate bank accounts and paying each for particular household expenses (Lewis 2001:165).
Hofstede’s Cultural Dimentions. Individualism vrs Collectivism
Geert Hofstede analyzed national cultures in an empirical investigation from 1967 to 1973 with 116,000 employees from all levels of the multinational concern IBM, in more than 50 countries. He came to the conclusion that national cultures differ in four fundamental cultural dimensions (Goodwin 1999:23):
• Power Distance
• Individualism versus Collectivism
• Masculinity versus Femininity
• Uncertainty Avoidance
Later Hofstede and his colleagues identified a fifth dimension, long versus short term orientation, which won’t be included in our discussion as it is a work-related concept. These dimensions enable quantitative and qualitative analysis of various cultures as well as their distinction and comparison. Notwithstanding that Hofstede’s four cultural variability dimensions are mostly related to business organizational values in different cultures, we apply them in a personal relationships area. While, as Stella Ting-Toomey notes, the four value dimensions should be viewed as a first systematic empirical attempt to compare cultures on aggregate, group level (Ting-Toomey 1999:66).
The Individualism versus Collectivism cultural dimension analyzes the relationships between an individual and a group. Individualism-collectivism is, probably, the major dimension of cultural variability, explaining differences and similarities across cultures. Hofstede identifies individualism as “the tendency of people to look after themselves and their immediate family only” (Hofstede 1980:419). Individuals’ goals are more important than groups’ goals in individualistic cultures. Members of individualistic cultures have many different groups (e.g., family, social clubs, professions) and tend to be universalistic and apply the same value standards for everyone. In contrast, groups’ goals is the main priority for members of collectivistic cultures. Such aspects as mutual support and common action are particularly highlighted by them. Members of collectivistic cultures have only a few general groups that influence their behaviour according to the situation and which tend to be particularistic, e.g., apply different value standards for in-group and out-group members (Gudykunst and Mody 2001:27). Among individualistic countries are the United States, Great Britain, Canada and Germany. Latin America, South-East Asia and Africa tend to be rather a collective form of society.
