Joint finances when you have children?

Goldiegirl

Guest101 wrote: »

There is nothing wrong with a family relying on one parent for financial and one parent for practical/emotional support.

There's nothing wrong with that at all, as long as both roles are seen to be equal in the relationship, and both parties are in agreement with where the relationship and family are heading.


But what I remain curious about is how one partner ( usually the woman) doesn't seem to have any equality in the relationship when she stops working. I can't see how this happens, unless she's never had any equality to start with. Plus, why would anyone allow a relationship to progress when they weren't seen as an equal. I still don't get it

BigAunty

Goldiegirl wrote: »

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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.

The Womens Aid website makes clear that most abusers do not commence their campaign until some time into the relationship - there is upfront charm.

Their ultimate aim, and remembering that abusers play a long game, is to dominate the woman and make her utterly dependent on him, hence the financial control.

I would assume that pregnancy and motherhood makes the victim especially vulnerable as they are more likely to have to financially depend on their partner and are more likely to be out of the workforce then. A child ties the woman to the household and more to the house itself.

Domestic abuse is about a pattern of controlling behaviour, ruining the confidence of the woman, breaking her will and applying pressure tactics so the abuser gets their own way.

So there is likely to be a long period of a variety of tactics used to subordinate the woman piece by piece rather than just a one off discussion of 'oh, lets set up a joint account where you have no access to it.'

Ronaldo_Mconaldo

Me and my wife set up a joint account when we bought our house. We put £500 a month in each by standing order and all direct debits for the house go out of there. We then keep our own money in our own separate accounts. Nobody pays the bills, the money just gets taken. We have a 3 year old. I don't know what the big deal is.

Guest101

BigAunty wrote: »

The Womens Aid website makes clear that most abusers do not commence their campaign until some time into the relationship - there is upfront charm.

Their ultimate aim, and remembering that abusers play a long game, is to dominate the woman and make her utterly dependent on him, hence the financial control.

I would assume that pregnancy and motherhood makes the victim especially vulnerable as they are more likely to have to financially depend on their partner and are more likely to be out of the workforce then. A child ties the woman to the household and more to the house itself.

Domestic abuse is about a pattern of controlling behaviour, ruining the confidence of the woman, breaking her will and applying pressure tactics so the abuser gets their own way.

So there is likely to be a long period of a variety of tactics used to subordinate the woman piece by piece rather than just a one off discussion of 'oh, lets set up a joint account where you have no access to it.'

It's interesting you use the word abuser, but instead of victim, you substitute woman.

Just something to note

enthusiasticsaver

Ronaldo_Mconaldo wrote: »

Me and my wife set up a joint account when we bought our house. We put £500 a month in each by standing order and all direct debits for the house go out of there. We then keep our own money in our own separate accounts. Nobody pays the bills, the money just gets taken. We have a 3 year old. I don't know what the big deal is.

Does your wife work full time though and who sorts out childcare and pays for it? The problems seem to arise when the wife stays at home to look after the children so I am assuming if your wife still puts in £500 then she is working full time in which case this is the reason why there in no problem for you.

BigAunty

Guest101 wrote: »

It's interesting you use the word abuser, but instead of victim, you substitute woman.

Just something to note

Just something to note - my comments related to info provided on the WOMENS aid website.

I have contributed to threads by victims of male abuse who have their own support organisations and same sex relationships, too, and I have raised the concept of mutual domestic abuse on numerous occasions.

enthusiasticsaver

BigAunty wrote: »

The Womens Aid website makes clear that most abusers do not commence their campaign until some time into the relationship - there is upfront charm.

Their ultimate aim, and remembering that abusers play a long game, is to dominate the woman and make her utterly dependent on him, hence the financial control.

I would assume that pregnancy and motherhood makes the victim especially vulnerable as they are more likely to have to financially depend on their partner and are more likely to be out of the workforce then. A child ties the woman to the household and more to the house itself.

Domestic abuse is about a pattern of controlling behaviour, ruining the confidence of the woman, breaking her will and applying pressure tactics so the abuser gets their own way.

So there is likely to be a long period of a variety of tactics used to subordinate the woman piece by piece rather than just a one off discussion of 'oh, lets set up a joint account where you have no access to it.'

I take your point and yes it makes sense that no one in the early stages of a relationship is going to be wearing a sign to say they are liable to be an abuser but presumably there are clues that this is the way a relationship will go? I am an innocent in this as never been in an abusive relationship so fully accept I may be a bit naïve so perhaps we should be educating ourselves more before launching into serious relationships and marriage.


Incidentally when my husband and I got married 33 years ago we had to attend marriage classes at the local church we were getting married in and they brought up issues like would both of us work if we had children. How would we feel if we could not have children. Whether our view of each other would change if either of us had an affair or lost our job or suffered mental or physical illness. I wonder if they still do that? My daughter and her husband got married in a civil ceremony at a local country club so there was not that level of discussion although they had been living together for almost two years before they got married. Maybe parenting and relationship classes should be put on the education curriculum along with financial education

Ronaldo_Mconaldo

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

Does your wife work full time though and who sorts out childcare and pays for it? The problems seem to arise when the wife stays at home to look after the children so I am assuming if your wife still puts in £500 then she is working full time in which case this is the reason why there in no problem for you.

She works 4 days a week as a high school teacher. We don't have childcare costs because we have family to look after our 3 year old.

DS4215

I suppose in some ways we are like that. I am the only one that works, and all my wage goes into my account, *but* at the same time I pay for *everything*. So while my wife just gets the child benefit (no tax credits for us now ) and usually spends it on our child, due to our current financial situation she actually has more "cash" available to spend each month than I do.

If she was working, I would expect her to contribute towards the household expenses but not to spend her entire wage on bills.

Percy1983

As it is with our first child on the way we are setting up for this and can say I see no problems as we don't operate on mine and yours.

As it is I do earn more and we have settled into a pattern of me paying enough into the joint to cover all the household bills and she generally pays for the shopping/petrol etc. Overall with this I do put more in on a monthly basis but I earn more so why not, with that I would rather she stays in the career she likes rather than trying to keep pace with my salary.

I do plan to use shared parental leave which will cut my income back at points while she works.

Past that the intention is for her to cut back to 3 days a week on here return, with the offset of my last promotion this will leave us back at where we was both full time before my promotion.

So we will need to do some tweaks but overall it will just mean we will have a little spare cash (as you would expect having a baby), but overall most money will go in the joint account where she is free to spend it how she pleases (as we both know we will both be reasonable), there is no reason to explain where every penny goes and of course we will discuss big purchases.