I mean I won't say that it's out of the question for that to be a possibility, as there ARE plenty of women who treat dating as a transaction of beauty for money... but I think it would be ignorant to assume that just because a woman shuts down men her age for an older guy that it has to be a result of money.
Also, echoing what
@characternote is saying, yeah it's a number's game, but it's not JUST a number's game. Think of it like sales...an ugly, fat, short, bald man does 10,000 approaches, and Chad does 10,000 approaches. Even if they say the exact same s***, one "product" is way better than the other, completely removed from other factors like how much they make or where they live.
@sangheilios the thing that comes with practice isn't an "a-ha" moment, but a bunch of small adjustments to gradually make you better at "pitching your product". "Game" isn't like some cheat code where you magically know what to say, but you can read a situation and adapt better to it because you've been in them hundreds of times.
Let me break this down for you in a way you might understand:
I usually don't go to the bars or clubs until it's maybe 2 hours till close. Why? The girls that are there AT THAT TIME probably do not have a boyfriend to go home to, or another party or bar they're hopping to, because they're likely single and looking for the same thing you are.
If I have it my way, girls who are either by themselves or separate themselves from their friends are more likely one-night-stands. Why? Because they don't have to worry about how their friends might judge them if they like you and decide they want to kiss you, or dance with you, or go home with you.
I could go on and on but the reason why approaching over and over again builds that skill is NOT just because you have a large enough sample size that you're "guaranteed" to get a result, you get better BECAUSE you had those conversations, and know what your audience wants, and how to look for those cues, and what your next move should be to get X result.