There are countervailing pressures.Data on marital histories confirm the importance of money. For one thing, the higher somebody’s income and the better educated they are – whether male or female – the later they are likely to marry in the first place. Also, the big difference between men and women turns out to apply to high-income earners.The balance between being a good catch and being financially self-supporting is different for the sexes Rich men, once caught, tend to stay caught. They get married later but stay married longer, on average, than low-earning males.

Rich women also marry later, but once trapped are more likely than their poorer sisters to bail out. For women, high earnings buy freedom and make marriage an optional extra, in financial terms at any rate.Mrs Hart would have done well to think about her financial position before letting passion sweep her away. She has put the pounds 250,000 family house up for sale, but is reported to have said: “I am ruined.”The normal human reaction to this particular divorce, about as messy as can be, seems to have come from Mr Hart’s mother. Hectored about David’s abandonment of his financial responsibilities to keep his wife and pay the children’s private school fees, she told her daughter-in-law to “roast in hell”. For the penalties beyond this world, there is no cost-benefit analysis.. It was a seminal moment in British sport Maybe it was a seminal moment for British society. On Monday night Robbie Fowler, the Liverpool and England striker, was awarded a penalty in a top-of-the-table clash against Arsenal after being apparently tripped by the Arsenal and England goalkeeper David Seaman.

Then something happened, something so bizarre it has no precedent in the modern game.
Fowler was honest. He turned to the ref (and to the TV cameras) and mouthed “No, no”, waving dismissively that it was not really a penalty He had simply tripped. Seaman had not touched him.I was reminded of Tom Stoppard’s comedy Professional Foul, which mixes football and philosophy. A philosopher asks a professional footballer why players from opposing teams always appeal for a throw-in when “every bloody time” the player who actually kicked it out of play knows that he did. What are the moral and philosophical boundaries between loutishness, dishonesty and simply wanting to gain an advantage for your team?With penalties, soccer etiquette – or lack of it – has been even clearer You always contest a penalty award against you You never dispute a penalty award in your favour Cricketers may walk but footballers never, never talk Yet Fowler did, or tried to.

And then the action became surreal enough to give philosophers an entire seminar. So unprecedented was Fowler’s honesty that no one knew how to handle it.The ref who had blown his whistle and pointed to the spot was expecting the usual clamour of protests from the Arsenal players. But a protest from the player about to take the penalty? He hadn’t been taught about that at referee school. The next day he said simply that he hadn’t heard Fowler say anything. “He obviously didn’t hear him waving then,” noted one commentator acerbically.