For years, sad boys have been asking: why doesn’t the cute girl who sits across the room from me in AP World History like me? Sadly (and unfairly to themselves), some begin to believe that they are utterly not worth the time. Happily, some find solace in the fact that women, like any other human being, are entitled to like who they darn well please, and they move on. Still others, devastatingly, turn to angry dude blogs and meninism. Regardless of the outcome, through hard-hitting journalistic measures, I believe I may have finally found the real reason why your Manic Pixie Dream Girl isn’t all that interested in your advances.

In recent weeks, it has been brought to my attention that ANY lady who is single is single because she hasn’t “given the right guy a chance” or that she has “friendzoned” the “nice” guys. Rather than tackle these explanations with head-on rationale that explains how the friendzone only exists when you assume that all relationships are built on the assumption of future sex, or that maybe these “nice” guys aren’t really “nice” guys, my research led me to the discovery that there is an overwhelming common denominator between girls and who they like: Whether or not the boy in question has a car AND money.

Out of the girls I interviewed on the topic, an overwhelming 70% said that they preferred males with stable income and independent modes of transportation as opposed to “scrubs” who would just “hang out of the passenger side of his best friend’s ride, tryin to holla at me” (this option clocked in at exactly 0%).

The remaining 30% were uninterested in the male population on the whole, regardless of financial stability and ownership of wheels.

So sad boys everywhere, heed my advice: if you want the ladies, get your own act together. Or at least, get to work on getting your own act together.

This article was written by Maggie McAlister, as loving advice to all of the Sad Boys in her life. She thanks Good Charlotte and TLC for the inspiration for this article. Also meninism is ridiculous. Follow her @madmaggs21 on Twitter.