Quote:
Originally Posted by Merch
My allowance is $250 a month which pays for my parking for the train, dry cleaning, and a 5 dollar lunch. My wife has $100 a month. After all is said and done, he roughly have the same free money.
As for Debbie's comment, I disagree completely with it. I bring home the lion's share, in fact my wife (who is an OT in Boston) would have to work 100 hours a week to earn what I earn. The point is that it's not my money. It's OUR money. WE decide together where it goes.
My wife's full time job is SAHM of 2.
Now my wife does control a lot of the budget categories - food, gas (she uses the most), club membership, clothing budget, etc. I have to ask her if I can buy a shirt because she controls that virtual envelope.
The original question. I think $350 a month is more then enough. A make well over $70k and $350 a month is combine for me and my wife. I think your wife might see it as her money and you need to make sure you both see it as OUR money.
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Part of the problem here is that there's not an equivalent way to determine this.
Merch, some of the things your use your "fun" money, I would consider to be JOINT and thus should come out of the joint household money. Parking expenses earns you your income, thus should not come from your "fun" money (what fun is there for you in parking? or dry cleaning?). Since you and your SO agree to your allowances distribution, there's no problem.
The same with the OP. Part of what she is using the $350 for includes clothes. And I'm not sure that I'd even want to take a vacation separate from my SO, but on the other hand, my SO is someone I'd love to be with 24x7 if I could. But clothes I think should be joint.
The problem here is that OP and his wife are not agreeing. Do I think she's being unreasonable? Do I think he's being unreasonable? I don't really know who (if anyone) is being unreasonable.
What I do know, is that there's a communication issue between these two married people and really the OP needs to find out what she's thinking.
If she does not care enough to discuss it normally, then why change anything? If the OP feels guilty enough to post the question, then he should be willing to talk with her and maybe give her a bit more from his that he does not seem to be using.
They even have 8 months EF and are okay in all other financial respects. The problem here is one of communication or lack of it. And IMO these two people just need to talk and understand each others' needs.