Any ideas when this became the norm? It used to be seen as scandalous in both directions: upper-class men and women were not supposed to marry into the working or lower classes.
because traditionally the male was the wage earner. so whoever he married, his standard of living doesn't change. in contrast, in traditional (ie my parent's generation, uk) roles, who the woman marries fixes her standard of living.
That's the usual hypothesis for why, but I was wondering when this became the norm, since traditionally there was quite a bit of social opposition to that direction as well. A man from "respectable society" wasn't supposed to marry someone from a poor family, or he'd be disowned, or at least cause a minor scandal. Particularly true among more prominent families with a family name to uphold.
You're conflating "social class" with "economic class". The old marriage thing was more about social class than economic - a man could marry a girl with no money if she came from a "good" family but marrying some rich girl with no lineage would be frowned on. (see: All of Downton Abbey) Also, one could be from "respectable society" but not be rich, if you had "good blood" or "good school", etc.
In modern life and in the US, we're much less aware of social class at all (or actively dislike the concept), and it's gotten (somewhat) decoupled from economic class. Someone who has become a lawyer or otherwise economically successful could be from any class and it's not unlikely they might choose to marry someone from a similar social class (with similar background) rather than someone with similar economic class.
I think this is a bit misleading. You hear tons of scandalous stories one way, but no stories, scandalous or otherwise, the other way. Which is truly less socially acceptable?
Hear about where? Is information about the attitudes that people in previous eras held towards marriage between different classes something you commonly run across just in daily life?
