Too gay to saved? : personal finance among Hong Kong young gay men at the intersection of class and sexuality

Abstract

The present thesis brings together compressed modernity, time, Bourdieusian class, and sexuality to study the personal finance of Hong Kong young gay men. It explores the implications of living outside the heteronormative chronology of life for the financial lives of young gay men from the post-1990s generation. The market is increasingly important in organizing individual welfare. However, to date, there is an absence of work on whether and how lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals may engage in the market to mitigate risks and uncertainties. This is especially relevant as their non-normative lives unfold in East Asian societies where social institutions remain heteronormative. The thesis draws on in-depth interviews with 30 Hong Kong young gay men aged between 18 and 35 (M = 29.0), conducted between June and August 2023, and supplementary questionnaire surveys. It explores three sub-themes: (1) imagined non-heterosexual futures, (2) the tension between identity-based consumption and future-making, and (3) financial socialization and the limits of personal finance as a form of self-care. Respondents are categorized into three groups: middle-class, upwardly mobile, and working-class. Respondents differed in their projections of their non-heterosexual futures and coping with the associated uncertainties. The middle-class respondents, driven by a future-oriented habitus, were proactive in thinking ahead for their anticipated script of decline in a non-heterosexual context. The more present-oriented, upwardly mobile respondents projected a script of progress and dismissed the need for long-term planning; the future-oriented ones experienced turning points that prompted them to become future-conscious. Limited economic capital eclipsed the working respondents’ motivations to think ahead, who tended to be fatalistic about their futures. Respondents diverged in their temporal orientations in finance. Middle-class respondents tended to reject the need for, or engage with, identity-based consumption residually. They prioritized future-making over immediate consumption. The more present-oriented, upwardly mobile respondents embraced identity-based consumption and sidelined future-making; the future-oriented ones, in response to the turning points, had refashioned their financial dispositions and since prioritized future-making. The working-class respondents rejected identity-based consumption but did not engage in future-making for habitus and structural constraints. Class-based differences were evident in how respondents participated in the financial markets and reflected on the rhetoric of self-care. Middle-class respondents, who received intensive socialization from their parents and partners, utilized financial instruments to plan for the long term. However, they remained pessimistic about the anticipated lack of future emotional support. The future-oriented, upwardly mobile respondents (dis)engaged with financial instruments through trial and error and were sceptical about their ability to manage self-care. Some working-class respondents participated in the financial markets in an attempt to make quick money. Most from this class group dismissed the need for self-care. With a generational sensitivity, this thesis contributes to East Asian sexualities studies in three ways. First, it furthers a contextually grounded approach to understanding non-heterosexual futures. Second, it highlights the intra-generational differences in how sexualities are lived by foregrounding class as another key intersecting axis of difference. Third, it sensitizes scholars to the role of the financial markets in the lives of LGB individuals.

Keywords: Personal finance, non-heterosexual futures, Bourdieusian class, self-care, compressed modernity