Monday Musings: The vagaries of the Marriage Market!
When the Economic times front page declares the league tables in the marriage bazaar is undergoing a shakeout then one must sit up and take notice. The news item screams that the lure of IT in the marriage bazaar is fading and quotes a real matrimonial ad advising that IT engineers not to apply. I have read of many ways of diagnosing the waxing and waning of the fortunes of a sector – but studying the matrimonial ads for it... is certainly the most novel of them.
When the Economic times front page declares the league tables in the marriage bazaar is undergoing a shakeout then one must sit up and take notice. The news item screams that the lure of IT in the marriage bazaar is fading and quotes a real matrimonial ad advising that IT engineers not to apply. I have read of many ways of diagnosing the waxing and waning of the fortunes of a sector – but studying the matrimonial ads for it... is certainly the most novel of them.
I feel sorry for the IT engineers, but only for a second. Thereafter it is all glee and rejoicing – its poetic justice served even more poetically because for over two decades they have ruled the charts and made others feel like children of a lesser God. All these years they have been hailed as the modern version of knights in shining armour, galloping with their coding abilities in one hand and the promiscuity of a green card in another – the perfect candidate, the prized catch that most aspired for and a few got to. Finally as they fall from grace, karma catches up with them. Now they will know what it felt to be a mechanical engineer or a B Pharmacy or worse still a BA – Arts!!
It is clear that there is a certain caste system that works like the invisible hand in the market dynamics of open sourced marriages – the nautanki of arranged marriages are immune to this because they function like government controlled sectors, immune to the secular market forces of supply and demand.
However and thankfully, this caste system, contrary to its original cousin, is dynamic – as the fall from grace of the IT engineers clearly demonstrates. Some profiles have clearly held their sway across time zones – like the IAS, IPS and its myriad cousins. Despite the murkiness generally associated with them, they still command a certain premium. I am waiting eagerly for the market forces to do their job soon on them too. The day will be a red letter day when a matrimonial ad will warn ‘Bureaucrats need not apply’’.
Doctors, Engineers and Civil servants (I am still looking for what is Civil in them) have ruled the roost for many decades now. Will the following ever happen? – ‘Teachers will be preferred’; ‘Filmmakers must certainly apply’; ‘Arts and humanities must apply’; ‘Writers, Painters and musicians – where art thou?’! It appears that the movers and shakers of civilization have always been considered as products with poor velocity from the shelves of the marriage bazaar – products that people buy only when nothing else is available at the moment and the need is acute.
I must thank the Economic times for publishing a news item with so much consequence on its front page. It speaks volumes about the quality of business journalism. What’s next folks?
It is clear that there is a certain caste system that works like the invisible hand in the market dynamics of open sourced marriages – the nautanki of arranged marriages are immune to this because they function like government controlled sectors, immune to the secular market forces of supply and demand.
However and thankfully, this caste system, contrary to its original cousin, is dynamic – as the fall from grace of the IT engineers clearly demonstrates. Some profiles have clearly held their sway across time zones – like the IAS, IPS and its myriad cousins. Despite the murkiness generally associated with them, they still command a certain premium. I am waiting eagerly for the market forces to do their job soon on them too. The day will be a red letter day when a matrimonial ad will warn ‘Bureaucrats need not apply’’.
Doctors, Engineers and Civil servants (I am still looking for what is Civil in them) have ruled the roost for many decades now. Will the following ever happen? – ‘Teachers will be preferred’; ‘Filmmakers must certainly apply’; ‘Arts and humanities must apply’; ‘Writers, Painters and musicians – where art thou?’! It appears that the movers and shakers of civilization have always been considered as products with poor velocity from the shelves of the marriage bazaar – products that people buy only when nothing else is available at the moment and the need is acute.
I must thank the Economic times for publishing a news item with so much consequence on its front page. It speaks volumes about the quality of business journalism. What’s next folks?
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