Looking for your soulmate? Better head to LinkedIn.
Bloomberg Business recently analyzed the United States Census Bureau’s 2014 American Community survey to determine whether people in certain occupations are more likely to marry people from other occupations.
In other words, Bloomberg wanted to determine whether, say, a computer programmer has a better shot with a lawyer than a dentist.
It’s no secret that career compatibility plays a major role in relationships. A North Carolina State University analysis showed financial conflict as the primary reason for conflicts leading to divorce, and lifestyle differences also contributed significantly to breakups. However, Bloomberg’s report takes the concept further by attempting to show how people in different careers gravitate towards different types of relationships.
The U.S. Census Bureau’s survey covered 3.5 million households, so Bloomberg had plenty of info to work with. The data is somewhat limited in that it only tracks marriages; people in other long-term relationships didn’t make the cut, so keep that in mind.
Here are a few of their most interesting findings.
1. The most common type of marriage was between grade-school teachers.
This isn’t too surprising; teachers share fairly standard schedules, along with similar lifestyles (anyone who’s ever had to make lesson plans every night for a week understands the struggle of dating a non-teacher).
However, preschool and kindergarten teachers were more likely to choose mates from the “miscellaneous managers” category.
2. Chefs and head cooks were most likely to marry waiters and waitresses.
They also married within their occupation to a high degree. Waiters and waitresses were more likely to marry cooks, however, than chefs.
3. People with manual careers, predictably, married people in unrelated occupations.
Firefighters were most likely to marry registered nurses, while automotive mechanics were most likely to marry personal care aids.
It’s certainly no surprise that occupations with substantial gender disparities saw fewer marriages within their professional group. Likewise, professions with roughly equal representation of men and women saw more “in-group” pairings; lawyers, for instance, often married other lawyers.
4. High-earning women tended to marry people from the same income range.
Doctors and lawyers, for instance, tended to marry professionals who made roughly the same amount of money. Conversely, women from the middle and lower income tiers tended to “marry up,” according to Bloomberg.
Interestingly, male CEOs were fairly likely to marry secretaries and other administrative assistants. Female CEOs avoided that trend, primarily marrying other chief executives.
5. Female dancers were most likely to pair with welding, soldering, and brazing workers.
Your guess is as good as ours. Unfortunately, we don’t have much info to dig into, here, but it’s interesting information regardless—especially if you’re a welder.
Of course, your occupation doesn’t determine who you’ll love, and if you’re a mortician who really wants to marry a barber, this chart shouldn’t slow you down. It’s still a fascinating look at some of the factors that we use to find our eventual spouses.
Check out the full chart from Bloomberg here—and be sure to polish up your resume before your next date.