#86717 Scrimper wife with a flippant husband

[Genuine Article]

BQ#86717

The situation this woman described mirrors my own fairly closely: My husband is the bread-winner, I'm a SAHM, and I make 90% of the financial decisions in our house. I pay the bills, set aside savings, and know where every cent goes.

I feel as though a lot of the writers sided with the husband and basically said, yeah, earn your keep, your husband needs a break, but I just want to find whoever the husband is and shake him until his teeth rattle in his head. His wife staying home with their children is what makes him having a career possible, or rather, profitable. I'm making assumptions here, but I'm guessing that if she's home, she's handling most of the household chores like cooking and cleaning as well. So I really hope this guy is ready to redistribute those jobs once they're both working. I think he's envisioning a paradise where he gets more money for the same amount of work on his part, but instead it's going to be him working his regular job, plus grocery shopping and cooking.

Anyway, I asked D.A.R.E. his opinion on this question, and he pointed out that if she's handling the money, their budget might be very top-down, and maybe the husband doesn't agree with or "get" some of their long-term savings goals. So they need to be on the same page, because the husband doesn't seem to think some of their goals are more important than having fun money. I get wanting spending money, and yeah, it would be frustrating to not be able to spend any of the money you earn, but I also believe in saving for fun things, and there's a lot you can do with $40/month. If anything I think this wife is kind of generous, because I only factor in $10/month for each of us for spending money as opposed to her $10/week. What can I say, I'm a cheapskate. But then, D.A.R.E. is one of those people who never seems to want for much of anything. I asked him about it and he said he'll worry we don't have money for things, and then be pleasantly surprised when he finds out we do. I swear I'm not keeping him in the dark or making us out to be poorer than we really are; he just never checks our bank account.

I have a lot of hang-ups about "your money" vs "my money" vs "our money" vs "this is special birthday money" (growing up poor will do that to you), so when D.A.R.E. very rarely comments about it being "his" money, I panic and think, this is why I need my own money. It's the power of the purse. Money equals options. Basically, not having a "real" job where I earn an income makes me feel very vulnerable, and I feel for this woman whose husband doesn't seem to value the work she does at home because there's no income attached to it. Hence me wanting to shake him until his teeth rattle.

[Zedability]

THANK YOU.

[Craig Jessop]

This reminds me of a former co-worker, who was the primary breadwinner while his wife stayed home with their toddler and infant.

They were play-bickering one day, and the husband came back with "I MAKE MORE MONEY THAN YOU!" (apparently quoting How I Met Your Mother, and his wife knew it, so this wasn't totally boorish).

She responded, "Yeah, well I spend the money you make, so who's the smart one?"

[Portia]

Are most couples with one income earner this uneven in terms of household work? I will soon earn significantly less than my s.o. as a grad student, and we'll live together, and I don't think "glorified maid" is a part of the job description that would appeal to me. Although I enjoy a pleasant living environment, I don't think that my making less $$$ should mean I have to do his laundry or something. He'll probably have more free time than me.

We're decent at talking through these things, but I need to arm myself for any weird social norms I somehow missed. B-)

[Zedability]

I think that when income directly correlates to spare time, it's common for the spouse with less income to take on more chores. But there are other non-income-generating things that take time, like school or small children, that make a difference for every couple.

[Portia]

I think that when income directly correlates to spare time, it's common for the spouse with less income to take on more chores. But there are other non-income-generating things that take time, like school or small children, that make a difference for every couple.

I also have to admit that I care a lot more about my environment and am a control freak. So if he's not scrubbing a bathroom weekly, well, that's kind of my problem, but I definitely don't want the "income card" to be played. But a child would (presumably, LOL) be both of our problem, and I can see how we'd have wildly different viewpoints on how to spend our time and money. (This is an interesting article on how class differences pan out: apparently our combined incomes means we'd be considered a "high income" couple.)

And money is power: I definitely will have a death/divorce/depression fund before tying the knot.

I caught myself this weekend, when we were talking about his completely overwhelmed SAHM sister (who had a thousand yard stare like a Great War veteran the one time I met her), using the phrase "helping out" in reference to her husband.

He conceived four kids in five years and adopted an adult, it ain't "helping out."

[finp]

I asked this board question, and in retrospect it was kind of dumb to ask. The Board writers are predominantly college students, and lack the post-collage financial experience to draw from and base good advice on. I was particularly annoyed by some of the "his money" "your money" talk:

I would say if you want to go on that trip with your mom then you might want to make the money to go on it because it is apparent to all of us that he's not wanting the money that he earns to go towards that trip. That sounds fair to me, you want the trip, then you find a way to get the money.

The money he earns is the FAMILY income. I don't need to operate outside of those bounds any more than he does. What if he wanted a new cell phone? Does he have to become an uber driver on the weekend to pay for it? No. We plan for it and find the money within the existing budget. I feel the same process makes sense for my trip.

Husband doesn't dispute this concept in general, and while I appreciate the sentiment, Genuine Article, he doesn't really deserve to have his teeth rattled. Maybe just a smack upside the head once in a blue moon.

Also, while I appreciate that marriage counseling is probably very useful, why do people think it's an easy solution that costs no money?

[TheBlackSheep]

Because they have never pursued it, so they don't know that couples counseling isn't covered by insurance, and that even if it were copays can get expensive.

And couples therapy is way harder than individual therapy, even.

Yeah, the "his money"/"her money" talk is very frustrating to read, and I'm not even married.

[Emiliana]

Are most couples with one income earner this uneven in terms of household work? I will soon earn significantly less than my s.o. as a grad student, and we'll live together, and I don't think "glorified maid" is a part of the job description that would appeal to me. Although I enjoy a pleasant living environment, I don't think that my making less $$$ should mean I have to do his laundry or something. He'll probably have more free time than me.

We're decent at talking through these things, but I need to arm myself for any weird social norms I somehow missed. B-)

I think it's less about income and more about allotment of time. In the case of a stay-at-home spouse and a full-time-working spouse, I think it's assumed that the stay-at-home one will probably end up doing more of the chores, not because they're not bringing in income, but because...well, I would think that's part of the work that spouse is doing. (I don't think I phrased that well, but hopefully it makes sense.)

When my husband wasn't working and I was, he took over nearly all of the household chores. Now that we're both working we've ended up with a more balanced approach. This summer when he will be working full time plus teaching a summer class, and I am enjoying the sole perk of being a teacher (i.e. summer break) I will take over nearly all the chores. It balances out, depending on who is busier or more stressed at any given time.

FLNP, how involved is your husband in the budgeting? It seems like he isn't as sold on the long-term financial goals as you are, which would definitely be frustrating.

My dad recommends Dave Ramsey's "Financial Peace University," which is popular in evangelical circles, to pretty much everyone he meets. He's talked about how it helped him and my step-mom get on the same page with their finances. My husband and I haven't gone through the whole course or read the whole book, but we've talked through some things with my dad to help us decide on short-term and medium-term goals (mainly a plan for paying off loans).

Money seems like such a silly thing, but it can cause so much stress and heartache in a marriage. I hope y'all are able to figure out something that works for you both.

[Shrinky Dink]

So, genuine question here, what tools do you all use to budget? I've tried suggesting a budget to my husband, and we'll talk about it for a bit and decide that we'll spend about $60 on groceries for the week, go to the store and spend about that, and then never think about it again. We'll also do the same with other things where we say we'll only spend x amount on whatever random stuff, but we don't hold ourselves or each other accountable. How do you hold yourselves and each other accountable? How do you avoid those impulse purchases that add up? How often do you discuss it with each other? I've thought about doing the envelope system, but my husband would hate to carry that much cash and extra paper (even though his wallet had a 2 year old hunting license wedged in it) and I don't think either of us would actually keep up with updating it and not cheating. We're not financially hurting and I finally got a full time job with regular hours and benefits, so I feel like there's no time like the present to start budgeting. Anything else you can think of that might be helpful?

[Genuine Article]

For me it's not so much about not spending more than X on whatever, it's more about how much I put away in savings. I have a simple spreadsheet with columns for all the stuff I want to earmark money for, and if I'm consistently setting money aside for those things, we spend what we spend on the basics. That said, little things like buying store brand cereal and saving up your spending money and waiting to buy something you want go a long way. I update my spending spreadsheet pretty much daily, but once a week would probably do, and if you're not up for updating things constantly, use mint.com and it will do most of the work for you. Plus you can play with their neat graphs. I like being able to compare how much I spent on gas or groceries or whatever to the previous year.

I say if you're not hurting financially, pretend that you are (not to the point that you're miserable) and save it for a rainy day. Like Cognoscente mentioned in another thread, you have to fend off the lifestyle creep. I think we've all been there where you're riding high and it's like, why not buy X, we're doing fine, and then when low times hit you look back and wonder, what was I thinking buying X,Y, and Z? If I hadn't spent that money then, I'd have it now. Anyway, some of my categories for savings are home repair, home improvement, new car, emergency fund, c-section fund, travel, utilities, and misc. general savings.

[Marduk]

I also think it is helpful to use savings systems that automatically take money out of your hands (even if it is just into another account) before you get it. This could be anything from a 401k/IRA contribution to a separate account, to a third-party system like Acorns. Decide what you can budget for that savings and set it up so that it automatically withdraws from your account when your paycheck is credited, and then it is out of sight out of mind (until such time as you had previously agreed on to use it, like retirement/house down payment/car purchase/whatever.)

[Katya]

I recently started using YNAB (You Need a Budget) and I really like it. It's got a bit of a learning curve and it's not free, but I think it's well worth $5 a month and it's doing a good job of motivating me to save more than I have in the past.

[Zedability]

I think we've all been there where you're riding high and it's like, why not buy X, we're doing fine, and then when low times hit you look back and wonder, what was I thinking buying X,Y, and Z? If I hadn't spent that money then, I'd have it now.

And then you're sitting at home browsing the Internet on your really nice HP Spectre while eating rice and beans for dinner for the third night in a row.

Hypothetically, I mean.

[Portia]

If I hadn't spent that money then, I'd have it now.

That is definitely a "saver" mentality though. If you're a spender ... yeah ... no