I see this situation/problem as much more complex. Remember, the U.S. is a non-socialist society with no real safety nets and our politicians are constantly working hard to gut and destroy what few we have (welfare, Social Security, public education, etc). Unlike in Europe, people here pretty much have to fend for themselves and cannot rely on the government to bail them out in the event of personal economic disaster. (In Germany for example, unemployment is a huge issue because many people have realized that it's more lucrative to live off government checks than to work) Women on average are still paid 1/3 less in the workforce than their male counterparts, and to boot many women on entering their 30s feel a strong urgency to have children, so achieving security through a career becomes less of an option or less important because society says women belong with the kids. And since western culture values younger women much more than older ones, the older a woman gets the more fragile her economic security becomes, especially in a capitalist world. No one wants to face old age living on cat food or at the mercy of state health care workers. But for women such a fate is likelier than for men (statistically speaking). American girls may not have pensions and Social Security to fall back on by the time they're old enough to collect it but still need time to raise the kids. So landing a man who can provide well seems even more important.
Men don't have the same experience because we are taught from childhood that breadwinning comes first and we can procreate at any age. A lifetime spent in the workforce is expected of us. Women on the other hand are taught that marriage and motherhood come first and careers come last. This explains to some degree why men who live off their girlfriends/wives are thought to be losers but no one thinks anything of a woman being supported by a man.
Let's remember also that it has only been since the twentieth century that women married principally for love at all. Prior to that marriages in Eastern and Western cultures (Europe included) were most often arranged by parents, guardians or ranking family members on behalf of the bride with the criteria of desirable suitors ranked by monetary wealth and/or class. The girl's looks were the primary bait for the richer suitors and if she didn't have beauty then her family had to have a slammin' dowry, and lots of times the pickier suitors required both. It is no accident that hundreds of years ago Shakespeare depicted Juliet's parents as ready to marry her off to the highest bidder despite their own wealth. Who the girl actually "loved" was the last priority. In olden times Charles and Diana would still be married because Diana wouldn't have the expectation of loving her husband. Therefore it's hardly surprising or new that a hideous-but-rich bore like Donald Trump gets the prettiest rose in the flower shop. He gets reaffirmed status by virtue of her eye candy-ness, and she gets a lucrative annuity she can live off someday when she gets old and he dumps her. It's business.
Thrown in on top of all this mess are the anti-sex Puritan values this country was founded upon coupled with the constant images of consumerist trappings we are fed through the media. It is not enough to marry someone nice, we must marry a "winner". We must own this house, that car or this dress otherwise we aren't worthy. Yet because hetero men still place a huge value on a prospective wife's so-called virtue, prostitution is vilified. Women have to make their living the "honest way" and that means landing a good catch but without their families helping them to arrange the marriage. They have to land that man by campaigning alone and the competition is tough. So a certain predatory instinct comes out.
Today's women are struggling to make sense of all these old and new values being thrown at them and that's very hard. Give them a break.