Friendflation: Why money is becoming more relevant in relationships

From the Handelsblatt archive: If you have good friends, you get through life easier, have better relationships and reduce your risk of death. But what if the friendship fails because of money?

Dusseldorf. Wolfgang Krüger often cycled around 80 kilometers with friends. From the outskirts of the city they wanted to take the S-Bahn back to Berlin. But the friends then said they would still like to ride their bikes back. "But they had no desire at all. They simply didn't have the money," says Krüger.

He only understood that later. He then made a deal with a friend, with whom he often cycled later on: he would cover all the costs incurred on cycle tours. She should bring a salad in return.

Wolfgang Krüger is a psychotherapist, business economist and has written books about money and relationships. he says: “For friendships with different budgets to succeed, the person who has more money must take responsibility for sensing such situations without shaming.”

Money plays a much more important role in friendships than we think, says Krüger. And today money is becoming more and more important. On the one hand, this is due to the fact that the gap between rich and poor is increasing, and on the other hand, because we live in uncertain times. "In these cases, money plays a larger role. And so we are currently living in a time in which we define ourselves more strongly through money."

The student movement, on the other hand, emerged in a time of full employment and a somewhat carefree time: “In times like these, money becomes less important.”

Some people may therefore have the feeling that it is currently becoming more expensive to keep friends: there are the expensive bachelor parties, where groups of friends sometimes even expect to financially support a group trip to Mallorca. But there are also the visits to cafés, the dinners in the restaurant and the cinema visits where we spend expensive time with friends.

The “Financial Times” even described this feeling as “friendflation”. A word made up of the terms “friend” and “inflation” that is meant to describe the rising cost of maintaining friendships.

For the behavioral economist Stefan Trautmann from the University of Heidelberg, friendflation is nothing more than a manifestation of inflation that can reveal itself in shared experiences.

In this country, the catering industry in particular is recording significant price increases. According to the German Hotel and Restaurant Association (Dehoga), visits to restaurants became more than 26 percent more expensive between January 2022 and July 2025 - also because VAT was increased.

Inflation also affects cafés - and after all, they are particularly typical places to meet friends. “We see that when retail prices rise, people replace products with cheaper versions,” says Trautmann. The consumer replaces a product, such as Nutella, with its own brand. “But this so-called substitutability is much more difficult in the catering industry,” says Trautmann.

Visits to restaurants or cafés can be replaced to a certain extent by consumers eating in fast-food restaurants or ordering take-away, but the shared experience is lost. There is hardly a cheaper alternative for cafés, as chains such as Starbucks are not a cheaper option. This can be a problem for certain relationships.

Maresa* was picked up in the Porsche for the first date. At first she was impressed, but later the money pushed the two further and further apart. She, the student, and he, the entrepreneur in the wine industry, often didn't spend their free time together. He had a circle of friends in whom it was important to share expensive experiences - such as dining in restaurants for 300 euros. She studied and therefore had a thrifty circle of friends from the university.

The circles of friends mixed together - it was only through shared experiences that the different ways of dealing with money became apparent. While he flew to Ibiza with his friends for short trips and slept in expensive hotels, she often stayed at home with her student friends. At some point Maresa separated. Today she says that one reason for the separation was definitely the different handling of money. “It just wasn’t as important to me as it was to him and his friends.” Money stood between them too often.

Money doesn't play such a central role in every circle of friends, says psychotherapist Krüger. “Usually we look for friends who have a similar coinage.” However, financial matters play a role especially when money is anchored in our value system. For example, if I define myself by a new Rolex or a Porsche.

The decisive factor is not the amount of money, but our coinage. “We come from different parents, which dictate our attitude towards money,” says Krüger. So whether we are thrifty or generous.

But money can become a problem, especially when we discuss financial differences among friends. “Money is one of the last taboo topics in our society,” says Krüger. We even talked more about relationships and sex. If someone has less money and doesn't dare to talk about it, this often leads to them quietly moving away from their wealthier friend.

Such differences could only be overcome if the wealthier person senses the difference and takes action to save face, or if the person with less money learns to no longer define themselves by money. “In general, the latter doesn’t work,” says Krüger.

Friendships are essential. Our lifespan is largely determined by two factors: loneliness and dissatisfaction, says Krüger. “Friendships can contribute significantly to a long life.” In order to maintain good friendships, psychotherapist Krüger recommends investing two hours of time every week, for example by calling. Creative questions could keep the friendship alive – similar to partnerships. His suggestion for a creative question: “What role has money played in your life so far, and how are you feeling about it?”