On the other side of things, there are some men who just prefer to give a woman something instead of cash.
Plenty of guys have this whole "I'm paying her cash for sex" thing in their head and they see this as a negative thing (although it's not, you're helping to pay our bills and put food on the table) instead of the pure and wholesome endeavor that it certainly can be.
So if someone wishes to go out with the "illusion of of not having to pay", which I like to use the acronym IOONHTP, instead of IOP (The Illusion of Passion), then I'm all for going in a different direction.
Hey, anything for a new friend!
Anyone up for a dinner at The Bijoux?
Finally, in defense of Grace's thoughts above, if you're actually searching for a quid pro quo type of thing with dinner, etc., the dinner can be off of the clock and that's fine. But I don't think that I would be interested in going out to dinner as PART of my "pay".
In other words, I'd go out with someone to a restaurant. But I probably wouldn't go out to a nice dinner in place of getting paid for our time together. Really depends. If it's a dollar to dollar trade like that, I probably wouldn't do it, either.
Stuff that I need? Gift cards? Bartering for a gift certificate to Nordstroms? Yes. Sure. If you wanted to try something like that instead of just paying my rates, that's probably just fine.
I would suggest that if someone is interested in doing a bartering like this, just ask who interests you.
Elisabeth