saving money, saving relationships

When a friend or family member asks for money and you are unable or unwilling to help, how do you say no without damaging the relationship? A new study by Kristen McNeill and Rachael Pierotti in Socio-Economic Review investigates this universal dilemma through interviews and focus groups with factory workers in Cote d’Ivoire. The findings suggest that the practice of earmarking, or explaining that one’s money is already set aside for another purpose, can resolve this dilemma, leaving one’s savings—and the relationship—intact after a monetary ask.

In some cases, the rhetorical strategy of earmarking is deployed with all sincerity: a potential giver wants to help but genuinely feels they cannot. In other cases, when the asker is perceived as undeserving or the expense frivolous, a potential giver may fabricate an earmark as an excuse for not choosing to help. In both cases, earmarking provides a socially acceptable reason for refusal that helps maintain the relationship. Additionally, the authors demonstrate that an individual’s perception of being able to give is itself subjective. When the asker’s need is deemed sufficiently urgent and socially valued, like a medical expense, the potential giver generally feels able to give even if it means overriding an earmark.Earmarking isn’t only a strategy for saving money, it’s a strategy for saving relationships.

The authors’ discovery that some earmarks are (or can be) overridden while others remain intact suggests the distinction between can’t help and won’t help is—at least when it comes to money—more complicated than it may initially appear. It also demonstrates that earmarking isn’t only a strategy for saving money, it’s a strategy for saving relationships.