More Sex Means More Money

Employees with active sex lives perform better at work, a new study reports. Those who get it on two or three times a week earn 4.5 percent more than their less coitus-inclined colleagues, proving that our bedroom and boardroom behaviors are more closely linked than we may like to think.

Given that the wages and sex lives of Generation Y are in well-documented decline, this could just be the two-birds-one-stone solution we’ve been looking for.

Dr. Nick Drydakis and his team at Anglia Ruskin University in the UK charted data from 7,500 participants analyzing the association between sexual activity and wages. They uncovered a strong correlation between the two areas: ‘Contemporary social analysis suggests that health, cognitive and non-cognitive skills and personality are important factors that affect wage level,’ says the paper.

"The vast medical and psychological literature concludes that sexual activity is associated with good health and improved physical and mental capacities, psychological well-being and dietary habits,” Drydakis said of the study’s findings. Maslow's Need Hierarchy Theory claims that the happier and more fulfilled individuals are in their lives, the more productive and successful they will be in their work, translating to higher wages. The theory concludes that people need to love and be loved, sexually and non-sexually, by others. In the absence of these elements, people may become susceptible to loneliness, social anxiety and depression—all factors that can affect their working life.”

Lucie, 24, agrees. “If you’re happier at home and feeling confident in a relationship, it makes sense that you’d perform better at work. If a direct correlation was found between sex and earnings, I’d be very happy to sleep with my boyfriend more often to get ahead! Sex and work are both important aspects of life, so being active in both—particularly if it means making more money—is key.”

One thing the study didn’t unearth is what comes first: are higher earners better at talking people into bed, or do those with good sex lives feel more confident when it comes to the working world? Either way, the message is clear: getting it on is good for your health, and with paltry wages and graduate unemployment levels sky high, why argue?

Indeed, making an impression in the workplace is tougher than ever for millennials, who are leaving college steeped in debt only to find they can’t get the job they need to start paying their way out of the hole. And it’s hardly a surprise that sex is now a far less frequent feat when so many twentysomethings are still living at home—maintaining a healthy sex life when shacked up with mom and dad isn’t exactly an easy task. If young people can’t get their emotional and sexual fulfillment because they can’t afford to move out, but can’t get a job that’ll enable them to pay rent, how can we expect the situation to change?

When it comes to Drydakis’s research, no: correlation does not equal causation—sex five times a week won’t make your bonus that much bigger. But, if improvements in the bedroom encourage those in the boardroom, who wouldn’t want to put in a little more effort?