The Value of Beauty

A lady once lamented to me, “Why is it so hard to find a nice, rich guy? I'm good looking, and I have suitors, but many of them just don't cut it.”

I thought that was shallow, and proceeded to preach about the insignificance of beauty and wealth, and about what traits should really matter. Unfortunately, my wise words fell on deaf ears. Now that I've pondered about it, I realised how unreasonable I was. She was simply stating her preferences for rich men. In retrospect, I would have been more helpful had I analysed her predicament based on the two variables she defined, which were beauty and wealth.

Now, what is beauty? Granted, the concept of beauty is complex. Philosophers have, since the beginning of time, tried to encapsulate it. In the lady's context, it should be assumed to be physical attractiveness. Even with such a precise definition, our analysis would prove difficult. As the famous saying goes, “Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder.” In short, beauty is subjective, due to exogenous factors, or perhaps even merely the differential preferences of individuals. An attempt to identify all of these factors would be an insurmountable task. In order to make some progress, it would have to be assumed that everybody has the same perception of beauty.

After deconstruction, the lady's predicament was simple. It was an offer of beauty for wealth, the trade of one asset for another. If the value of her beauty matches the wealth of her suitor, it would be a fair trade, no?

Obviously not. Physical attractiveness fades with time. At the age of 45, I'm sure our protagonist will not proclaim herself to be good looking any longer. In fact, when she is a wrinkly old hag at the age of 60, there will hardly be any remnants of her past beauty. It is also apparent that physical appearances deteriorate more rapidly as aging occurs. In economic terms, beauty suffers from accelerating depreciation, with no residual value at the end.

On the other hand, wealth begets more wealth, thanks to the wonder of compounding interest. It can be said that the growth of wealth is exponential. This is, of course, assuming that the rich man in question manages his finances well. Wealth would thus be an earning asset, with new income integrating with current wealth.



The graph above represents the two variables over time. The intersection point would be where our protagonist deems her suitor worthy of her. From that point on, the value of the suitor's wealth would become increasingly higher than her beauty. It is clear that our rich man would reject such an unfair offer. It would make much better economic sense to lease our lady instead!

With such dire outcomes, what should our distressed damsel do? I would love to hear your comments!

PS: Lady in question, if you are reading this, I am merely trying to resolve your predicament. Please do not get upset!