Minnetonka Financial Guys: Serving Committed Gay and Lesbian Couples Is Good for Business
Carl Jones and I took to each other last month because he was wearing even a nicer hat than mine. We were among a handful of attendees at a showing of “Saving Marriage” at the U of M Law School last month, shown by Jewish Community Action, which for months has been fighting the Minnesota Marriage Amendment.
A financial services rep at the MidAmerican Financial Group in Minnetonka, Carl was there learning more about the issue of gay marriage and, frankly, looking for business.
“You gotta be in the game,” Carl told me a few days ago at his office in Minnetonka. “I showed up.”
A smart businessman and an African American, Carl is looking to offer his services what he calls “diverse markets.” MidAmerican is part of Met Life, the New York financial services company that’s been front and center in outwardly supporting gay rights causes and gay families.
His understanding of the needs of gay couples was borne out in a pair of articles on gay marriage in Friday’s New York Times. In one, called “Gay Marriage Bans May Come at a Price,” the Human Rights Campaign’s Brian Ellner was quoted on the marriage equality fight in New York State:
“We heard over and over from the C.E.O.’s of major corporations that they don’t want any impediments to recruiting the best people, period, whether they’re people who want to live in a tolerant city or state or gay people who want to live where they feel their families will be protected and safe.”
Another MidAmerican financial services rep in I met with is Adam Elg. He’s been in a 26-year committed relationship with his partner, and he told me about the financial barriers gay couples face simply because they’re not married.
True enough: A friend of mine calculated she and her partner had spent an extra $288,000 on health care alone over the past 30 years, simply because she and her very longtime partner couldn’t get married.
Or is that understated? As Tara Siegel Bernard wrote yesterday, the Times several years ago quantified the incredible cost of marriage inequality to committed couples. "In a worst case," Siegel Bernard wrote, “a family of four would need to spend nearly $470,000 more than a heterosexual married couple in an identical situation."
Most striking about Carl and Adam’s chat wasn’t their eagerness to chat up new business. What’s striking is the MetLife ad they gave me.
As an African American, Carl found "a lot of parallels with LGBT experiences. Being excluded Not being o the same level. I have a great deal of empathy for anyone who has experienced discrimination."
You have to be sort of an old person to remember this, but why did I suddenly think of the 1968 TV show "Julia"? That was the groundbreaking weekly show that featured an African American in a role in which a star played, for the first time and, for the most part, not an African American breaking new ground on TV but just another homeowner down the block.
At some point companies won’t have to offer special “products” to appeal to unmarried committed couples.
Voting No on the Minnesota Marriage Amendment this fall would be one place to start.
