What Nobody Tells You About Being The Single Friend

Hello everyone.

I'm Alexa Claire, TFD's content and production manager,

and this is our brand new series, The Single Tax.

While I spend a lot of time talking about money for work, I also,

of course, live it.

As a single woman in an expensive city,

formerly DC and now recently New York City,

>> >> and as someone working in personal finance media,

it's hard not to notice how much the world is set up to favor

couples,

and how often single people end up footing the bill.

I'm building stability without a second income to lean on.

Every safety net that I build, every splurge, every risk I take,

is backed by one paycheck.

The consequence of anything not working out is mine alone to own,

but I could say the same for when things go well.

Throughout this series, I'll be talking about the single tax, that invisible, financial, emotional,

and mental tax single people pay for daring to be unpartnered in a world

designed for couples.

But first, a word from our sponsor.

Before we get into this episode,

we'd like to take a moment to talk about this series' sponsor, Betterment.

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Chapter one, the everyday tax.

When my partnered friend or friends grab the bill,

that expense is often shared at home or effectively absorbed by two incomes.

When I grab the bill, it's just me.

One income, one buffer, one risk profile.

That's the everyday single tax.

The moment I realized this wasn't theoretical was when I started feeling hesitant.

Hesitant when friends invited me out,

hesitant when the group chat said dinner or weekend vibes.

Hesitant when someone suggested let's just grab the whole bill and rotate.

For context, I am the only single person in my close friend group.

Pretty much everyone else partnered, engaged, or full-on married.

So, instead of splitting three ways and Venmoing, it became I'll grab it,

you get next time.

Spending time together started equating to time to empty my wallet

or at least make a sizable dent in my budget.

And it shows up at home, too.

I don't split rent, Wi-Fi, utility bills, or groceries.

I don't split the random Target run

that somehow comes to $83 for five items.

Can we talk about that?

There's no one to say I'll grab that surprise streaming bill.

Sure, you know, I have roommates,

but that measure of seemingly inherent care

and devotion of considering one another's peace of mind is absent.

As I'd expect it to be.

My roommates are so freaking sweet,

but do I expect them to cover my part of the electric bill just

because it was a tougher month for me financially

or emotionally?

Uh, no, I don't.

Meanwhile, I have several friends whose partners

or husbands did so for them

and continue to do

so.

That's just what it is.

And obviously, single-income households bring in less than dual-income households.

According to an article from Self, in 2024,

almost three quarters of family households were married couple households.

And according to the census data,

the average household income for married couples is $146,000.

Naturally, this amount ranges massively per household depending on age, location, and other factors,

but most, a little more than 55% of them earn over 100,000.

Meanwhile, the average single person living alone in the United States brings in a

whopping $56,000,

with single women making on average $11,000 less per year than their single male

counterparts at $50,270.

And what about expenses across food, medical, housing, transportation costs, and all the rest?

Single people spend $5,500 more per year than their partnered counterparts,

a figure that can easily add up to nearly a quarter of a million

dollars over the course of 40 working years.

A report by Vox found

that unmarried people can pay more than a million dollars more than married people

over the course of their lifetimes.

And that changes how I move through the world.

I'm more cognizant of the reverberations, or ripples, caused by my spending.

Not consequences, I want to be careful here

because in no way do I see being single

as a punishment.

I've learned, given depressing statistics like the ones I shared,

that celebrating being single is a delicate, yet still very much worthwhile endeavor.

Because being single is not a waiting room, like so many seem to think.

It is, in a lot of ways,

a specific kind of freedom

that I've genuinely come to appreciate

and think of as

that girl.

>> >> I can book a flight on a Tuesday for a Friday,

and the only person I have to clear it with is my bank account.

I can be fully, ungardedly myself with every person I meet,

sparking conversation with a stranger at a bar,

deep belly laughs with someone I just met at a party,

and there's no mental asterisk, no quiet self-monitoring,

no am I being too friendly?

running in the back of my mind.

As an extrovert who genuinely believes

that every person has something worth learning from them,

that freedom is not small.

And when my friend needs me, like really needs me, I can drop everything,

show up, and give her the other half of my bed for an impromptu

emo sleepover.

No worries on her end about disturbing my nightly routine with my partner

or anything like that.

No hold on a sec, let me check with on my end.

Just me fully available for the people I love.

That's not nothing to me.

Not in the least.

And still, instead of being able to just mindlessly spend on XYZ purchase

or bill,

I do need to put

that extra thought into how will this affect the other things I'm budgeting for?

How might this require the often mentally draining work of having to be creative

with my coin later in the month

or on other spending categories?

Will buying this now cause me undue stress later?

Do I have the backup funds needed to offset that stress?

It also requires really solid boundary setting, and most importantly,

a community that respects those boundaries.

Like, no pookies, I actually need us to split our bi-weekly brunch date

or dine somewhere that makes splitting the bill individually easy.

If we do that, then yes,

I'd like your help in searching for those places.

Or, you know, let's be crazy and do something free.

Chapter two, the social and celebration tax.

Last year, I attended so many bridal showers, engagement parties, housewarmings, weddings, gender reveals,

baby showers, the list goes on.

While I'm so grateful to have friends who, first of all,

are being loved on the way they deserve.

Second, I'm so grateful for the fact

that I'm even being invited in the first place.

And third, just having something to celebrate.

It's not lost on me how absolutely expensive attending all of this is.

Like, us single girlies, as I mentioned earlier,

are paying the full rent and utilities, baby.

Like, and even aside from the money,

it's crazy how society has told me

as a single girly

that I have nothing to celebrate until I'm coupled.

Like, I want to celebrate the fact

that I just paid off the credit card

that has been eating up my credit score since I leaned on it during

my 2-year long unemployment.

That's a big deal to me.

Or someone else I know just bought this couch she's been eyeing forever.

Let's celebrate her.

But society has told single women, "Hey, if people don't RSVP to those gatherings,

you don't get to feel sad about it.

Because until you're coupled, those accomplishments are just to-dos on your task list,

not glittery moments worth a party and photographic evidence."

Meanwhile, it's fully reasonable for me to spend upwards of $1,500 for a weekend

of festivities that has a 50% chance of not ending up in divorce.

Come come now.

And you can't tell me this isn't connected to the economy.

Partnered festivities are positioned at the top of the party hierarchy

because they feed the money machine.

Wedding-related gatherings, including bridal showers, bachelorette, bachelor parties,

and the wedding itself contribute over $100 billion annually to the US economy

as of 2025 to 2026.

And this is despite economic uncertainty.

In fact, 85% of couples reported that when the economy impacted their planning,

they decided to adapt rather than scale back,

with 77% of those adjusting their budgets actually increasing their spend.

Now, TFD has covered this in our wedding season series a number of times.

Weddings and other partner-related gatherings often warrant registries, venue bookings, flight tickets,

hotel stays, car rentals, and so on.

My credit card payoff party warrants pizza, wine, and maybe a parking ticket.

Like, don't get me wrong.

I'm still going to celebrate me, myself, and I.

But, dang.

And that's just on the what warrants celebration side of things.

Let's talk about the cost of celebrating couples from, again, the weddings, the bachelorettes,

the engagement trips, the flights, the hotels, the gifts, the dresses, the beauty appointments.

Having to get PTO.

I mean, don't get me wrong, I love my friends deeply, deeply.

Guys, I love you.

I know you're watching.

But, let's be honest,

celebrating couple milestones as a single woman in your 20s and 30s,

even your 40s plus, is a recurring financial event.

Every spring and fall, my wallet shudders.

Like, winter is coming.

It's here.

The women's winter is here.

Because according to brides.com, as a bridesmaid, no matter the style of wedding,

I'm going to have to take care to budget far ahead.

For example, a local wedding may run you anywhere from $1,500 to $2,500 on

dress,

shoes, alterations, hair and makeup, nails, travel, accommodations, gifts, pre-wedding events.

A formal or black tie affair, meanwhile, typically runs higher,

around $2,000 to $3,500.

A destination wedding will have bridesmaids spending anywhere between $3,000 to more than $5,000.

Now, that's the bridal party side of things.

As a guest, with friends all over, I typically have to fly to weddings,

even if they're not technically destination weddings.

And those, according to The Knot, average a cost of $1,680 per wedding.

Also, it's not just weddings.

It's celebrating house purchases, baby showers, and gender reveals.

Meanwhile, in my effort to show

that I don't want to disappear from my friends' lives just

because they're partnered,

I'm paying this tax for showing up consistently, financially and emotionally,

for everyone else's partnership milestones.

And at times, these celebrations just get completely out of hand.

Chapter three, the connection tax.

Now, this one's sneaky.

We're told, "Just put yourself out there.

Build community.

Join something."

Okay, well, classes cost money, memberships cost money, clubs cost money, dating costs money,

moving to new cities costs money, therapy costs money.

Connection is paywalled.

I mean, living in New York City now,

I'm seeing that the average price for one adult gym membership is $106 per

month.

When you don't have a built-in person at home,

you tend to invest more in building your ecosystem cuz you have to.

Being single isn't a passive endeavor.

It's a lot of active labor,

and often with the carried risk of little long-lasting reward.

Quick side note, I can't totally blame partnered people here because, I mean,

after saving three times

as much as you would have

when you were single

and having an emergency contact

that isn't your mom,

I can wrap my head around why certain relationships last way longer than they

should.

Who wants to return to these musty,

dusty streets when they're as barren and costly as they are?

Chapter four, the risk and self-sufficiency tax.

I've got to mention this one because it's the one that's often forgotten.

While we're so focused on the ways the single tax impacts our more Instagrammable

public present moments,

it's equally, if not more, impactful on our private future moments.

With no second income, there's no fallback, no shared risk.

If I lose my job, it's just me.

If my rent increases, it's just me.

If I want to take a career leap,

there's no second salary buffering the experiment.

It takes twice as long to save up an emergency bucket to make the

risk safer.

The tax code only adds to the challenge.

We hear about the marriage penalty, but in practice,

many married couples pay less than two single people making the exact same money.

Single filers climb into higher tax brackets faster

and miss out on deductions designed with families in mind.

The system doesn't just tax income, it privileges partnership.

I mean, that goes for the fun stuff, too.

Hotels, flights, heck, even groceries.

They are sold as packages due to marketing strategies designed to increase average order

values and maximize profitability per transaction,

which contributes largely to our waste problem, but that's another video.

Housing markets reward couples.

Family leave policies largely presume partners.

Health insurance plans are built with spouses in mind.

The architecture of American economic life revolves around the two-income household.

Choosing to be or simply being single means navigating systems

that were not designed with your sense of ease in mind.

That changes how bold you can be when, how,

and if you reach your emergency fund targets, and ultimately,

how much risk you can tolerate.

And then there's this.

It's expensive to be self-sufficient.

Convenience spending goes up, outsourcing goes up,

burnout prevention goes up because there isn't someone else absorbing life admin with you.

Whatever you lack skill in in regards to life admin often becomes the part

of your life that feels the most burdensome.

They become untenable eventually,

and opportunities that come your way

that otherwise would have sat on a sturdy flat surface are now left to

try and stay balanced on a platform with a single pillar beneath it.

Hardly assuring.

There's no, let's divide and conquer, babe.

It's just me, my many personalities >> >> depending on, you know,

what part of my cycle I'm in.

Uh #PMDD girlies, what's up?

Say something in the comments.

And whatever discipline I've been able to maintain at this point in my life.

And that's not always easy.

Chapter five, the mental toll.

And layered underneath all of this is something we don't talk about enough.

As a single person, you're often not anyone's default or anyone's built-in priority.

Save your parents' if you're lucky.

You're not anyone's first call, really.

You don't have automatic plus-one status.

If you want to bring someone to something,

you got to go through the at times humiliating ritual of asking permission to

bring them,

whereas if you were partnered, they were already included in the guest count.

That doesn't just cost emotionally, it affects how often you go out,

how often you say yes, how often you hesitate.

And hesitation has financial consequences.

So, here's what I want you to hear.

You are not irresponsible.

You are not bad with money.

You are not behind.

You're operating inside a structure that wasn't built for you.

The single tax isn't one giant expense.

It's a thousand small ones.

It's the rotated bill, the solo rent, the wedding season, the gym membership,

the harder time building a higher emergency fund,

the Uber instead of splitting a ride.

If you've ever felt like your money stretches differently than your coupled friends,

you're not imagining it.

In the next episode, we'll talk about how to design around it.

But for now, welcome to the single tax.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the episode.

I can't possibly include everything, so share what else I'm missing in the comments.

Tune in next week for part two.

>> Woo!