Joint finances when you have children?

enthusiasticsaver

This is just a general enquiry about how people organise their finances when they embark on having children?


Now I have to declare that my husband and I did it the old fashioned way, marriage, house and then children so our finances were shared way before our daughters came along 25 or so years ago. I stayed at home for the first two years (except for a Saturday job in an accounts department) and we struggled on just my husbands wage, child benefit, (no tax credits then) and my small wage from just working 1 day a week while my OH looked after our girls. All our accounts are joint and although I take on the lions share of paying bills etc as I only work part time I make sure my OH knows what is coming out and going in.


A few threads recently have had women posting that their OHs control all their money and seem to imply if they are SAHMs then they should get very little as they do not "work". This seems to me a very controlling and nasty attitude to have to the mothers of their children but it does make me wonder why did this question not come up before having kids? How many miserable women are out there dependent on their OHs for money each week (really Housekeeping in this day and age?) and even if they get themselves jobs their OHs seem to expect them to still take on organising all the childcare in spite of the fact that this will be expensive.


In view of the £12bn cuts in welfare imminent I would think tax credits may be seeing reductions over the next few years so this problem may get worse. Any thoughts on this?

Goldiegirl

I don't have any children myself, but you've asked a question that has had me scratching my head recently.

I can only assume that these women allowed themselves to be in the same situation before they had children, because I can't imagine any partnership of equals would suddenly revert to one partner being totally in control just because a baby arrived.

Rambosmum

I've also been puzzled by the recent threads on the subject. I believe that it's 'family money', rather than 'min' or 'your'.

enthusiasticsaver

Goldiegirl wrote: »

I don't have any children myself, but you've asked a question that has had me scratching my head recently.

I can only assume that these women allowed themselves to be in the same situation before they had children, because I can't imagine any partnership of equals would suddenly revert to one partner being totally in control just because a baby arrived.

I agree so why would you have kids with these types of men?

thorsoak

I'm another who finds it strange that (a) a woman would allow herself to be placed in such a situation and (b) that such a situation exists.

Goldiegirl

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

I agree so why would you have kids with these types of men?

Exactly, and taking it even further, why be with a man like that in the first place.

I genuinely don't understand, and I'm hoping for enlightenment on this thread

Guest101

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

This is just a general enquiry about how people organise their finances when they embark on having children?


Now I have to declare that my husband and I did it the old fashioned way, marriage, house and then children so our finances were shared way before our daughters came along 25 or so years ago. I stayed at home for the first two years (except for a Saturday job in an accounts department) and we struggled on just my husbands wage, child benefit, (no tax credits then) and my small wage from just working 1 day a week while my OH looked after our girls. All our accounts are joint and although I take on the lions share of paying bills etc as I only work part time I make sure my OH knows what is coming out and going in.


A few threads recently have had women posting that their OHs control all their money and seem to imply if they are SAHMs then they should get very little as they do not "work". This seems to me a very controlling and nasty attitude to have to the mothers of their children but it does make me wonder why did this question not come up before having kids? How many miserable women are out there dependent on their OHs for money each week (really Housekeeping in this day and age?) and even if they get themselves jobs their OHs seem to expect them to still take on organising all the childcare in spite of the fact that this will be expensive.


In view of the £12bn cuts in welfare imminent I would think tax credits may be seeing reductions over the next few years so this problem may get worse. Any thoughts on this?

This is a dificult question. It's whatever works for the couple. That's the answer.

However.

Being a SAHM until the child(ren) enter full time education does bring in an income from the state.

It's about walking in the other person's shoes. Some SAHPs dont see the stress and strain of full time work. Equally FT workers dont see the stress and strain of FT parenthood.

The primary problem is frankly simple. An over reliance on the state to supplement the growth of a family.

Moving further along this. Relationships are very fickle if one parties contribution to the household is easily replaced by the state. IE break up, and the NRP pays child support, whilst the state funds a lifestyle which exceeds the one which was available in a 2 parent family.

What it actually means is that a large number of people who are otherwise in family relationships, find the stress and strain of having a family too much. They are not strong enough to hold the relationship together through the tough times.

The result is an epidemic of 1 or 4 parent families. And in the case of the latter, where only 1 of the 4 actually works.

Furthering this, which is bombarded constantly at the populous via widespread media attention. Is the fact that men (most of the time its men) feel they are easily replaced, and start to resent not only their work, but their own contribution and subconciously try to 'protect' themselves.

This forum in particular has a nasty habit of giving advice which perpetuates the problem. IE 'Chuck him, the tax payer will cover for you'.

Where as the real advice is 'try to listen and understand eachother'.

The number of abusive relationships hasnt gone up. The number of difficult and somewhat dysfunctional relations, which are now immediately classed as abusive, has.

I suspect more relationship would work were it not for the attitude adopted now by many in the name of equality. The search for the perfect partner. & the suggestion that it's 'better off' to break up a family.

Whilst being in an abusive relationship is never a good idea. There is nothing wrong with a family relying on one parent for financial and one parent for practical/emotional support.

Marisco

I'm another who doesn't understand the "mine and yours" situation either. And the one that I really don't understand, are those who work out % of their income so that both are paying the same amount!! :eek: Are folk so afraid that one will "get away" with paying in less than the other??

Gloomendoom

Marisco wrote: »

I'm another who doesn't understand the "mine and yours" situation either. And the one that I really don't understand, are those who work out % of their income so that both are paying the same amount!! :eek: Are folk so afraid that one will "get away" with paying in less than the other??

You are not the only one.

In the situation that the OP outlines where one partner stays at home to look after the children, the working partner is earning for the whole family and not just themselves. It isn't their money to keep.

musogirl295

DH and I merged finances when we first started living together (about 9 months after we met). We had decided to share our life and finances are part of that. We married not long after this and I gave up my employed job to go self employed, both of us knowing that he would be the main earner but that what I was doing was improving our future as it would allow us to have children without needing childcare. I just can't imagine how our life would work if we weren't working from one financial pot! In fact, since my husband works full time and I work part time and look after our child I have taken over the managing of the budget and household bills. If the majority of the bills were coming out of a sole account of his it would give him more work as he would be having to make time to ring companies to sort out the inevitable billing problems and switching of utilities etc. He is far happier with me being able to deal with all of this!

enthusiasticsaver

Guest101 wrote: »

This is a dificult question. It's whatever works for the couple. That's the answer.

However.

Being a SAHM until the child(ren) enter full time education does bring in an income from the state.

It's about walking in the other person's shoes. Some SAHPs dont see the stress and strain of full time work. Equally FT workers dont see the stress and strain of FT parenthood.

The primary problem is frankly simple. An over reliance on the state to supplement the growth of a family.

Moving further along this. Relationships are very fickle if one parties contribution to the household is easily replaced by the state. IE break up, and the NRP pays child support, whilst the state funds a lifestyle which exceeds the one which was available in a 2 parent family.

What it actually means is that a large number of people who are otherwise in family relationships, find the stress and strain of having a family too much. They are not strong enough to hold the relationship together through the tough times.

The result is an epidemic of 1 or 4 parent families. And in the case of the latter, where only 1 of the 4 actually works.

Furthering this, which is bombarded constantly at the populous via widespread media attention. Is the fact that men (most of the time its men) feel they are easily replaced, and start to resent not only their work, but their own contribution and subconciously try to 'protect' themselves.

This forum in particular has a nasty habit of giving advice which perpetuates the problem. IE 'Chuck him, the tax payer will cover for you'.

Where as the real advice is 'try to listen and understand eachother'.

The number of abusive relationships hasnt gone up. The number of difficult and somewhat dysfunctional relations, which are now immediately classed as abusive, has.

I suspect more relationship would work were it not for the attitude adopted now by many in the name of equality. The search for the perfect partner. & the suggestion that it's 'better off' to break up a family.

Whilst being in an abusive relationship is never a good idea. There is nothing wrong with a family relying on one parent for financial and one parent for practical/emotional support.

Thoughtful answer and I certainly agree that there is nothing wrong with relying on the husband(usually) for financial support so long as you do not feel you are going cap in hand and that financial decisions are still made jointly.


When my daughters were tiny I was a SAHM and my husband worked full time but money was very tight and lovely though it was to be at home it is hard work looking after 2 tiny little people (only 18 months between my two) so jointly we agreed I would take on a Saturday job and my OH would look after the children. He said he had never worked as hard and that was just looking after the kids, not doing housework, shopping etc which I did during the week. :rotfl: Similarly I discovered that working all day and then coming home to cranky kids and husband was not a walk in the park and realised what he had to put up with five days a week so we actually did "walk in each others shoes". I always think it is a good idea to get the dads looking after the kids for a day every now and again so they can see it is not all sitting with your feet up drinking coffee all day.


Of course inevitably things got easier as the children got older and I went back to part time work but I guess that kind of pressure manifests itself in all sorts of ways. I personally feel though that equality is a good thing and that every family has a right to do what works for them whether that is both working or only one (either mum or dad) but I certainly do not agree that walking away from a marriage, unless it is abusive, is necessarily the solution. As always it comes down to communication but my point is I wish that discussion would come before bringing children into the world.