Those of you who earn more than your partner, do you expect them to split the bills evenly, or do you cover the majority? I cover a solid 80% of our bills, sometimes more, which I wouldn't mind, but my husband wastes so much of his money. I want him to either put more money in savings or contribute more to the household expenses, but he says this request is financial abuse. 🙄 I'm starting to hate him, I think. Is this enough of a reason to leave, or am I overreacting? WYD in this situation?

If you’re married, just put all the money together and create a monthly budget together.

I agree with most of what the others have said. I earn 3x my husband, but we have never used “my/his money” terms in our marriage. It all goes to the pot and we pay the bills. We talk before making larger purchases. It’s worked for us for 20 years.

I'm with many of the others here, I think it is problematic to think about it as one spouse's money versus the other. Like ultimately it is the marriage's money. I get that if one person isn't "good with money" it may make sense to put them on an allowance or something so they can have autonomy within reason (my wife and I set a dollar amount we can spend on any given purchase without consulting the other as we don't want to set up a permission giving dynamic, neither of us buy smaller purchases infrequently enough to make that system not work). My wife and I have separate accounts in addition to our joint account largely because we just never bothered to update certain banking arrangements. I keep quite a bit more in my personal account because I happen to have some of our joint credit cards being paid out of it. I make sure all of the bills are paid out of either my personal or our joint account because I'm better about that kind of stuff. We live way below our means so I get that I'm privileged in how little stress we have about it but I make around 2x her salary (she has some variable business profits that sometimes she lets me take some out of her business too haha) and so things like maxing our the 401K ends up being a much bigger percentage of her salary by necessity but that has no impact on her beyond the money not hitting our joint bank accounts.

It sounds like it's already over....

... why is it mine/ his money if y'all are married? As my family taught me, 100% of earnings ( after 401ks and taxes and stuff) goes into one fund and then dispersed to other accounts for household expenses, THEN personal allowances, with both partners names on all of them. It should never be about even splitting OR having one person cover everything (when both parties are working.) Y'all are going to kill y'all selves and y'all's marriages still thinking separate when you've become one...

Everything goes into one pot - no separate funds

Been married almost 40 years....we have NEVER had my money, his money....always OUR money. We discuss how much goes to savings, vacations, bullshit, whatever, after bills are paid. Money is the 1 thing we never argue about. This is how much there is: feast or famine, you make the best with what you've got. Marriage is not a 50/50 partnership (a good marriage, that is) it's both people giving 100% .

Agree with other posters to seek counseling as there are deeper issues in your post than money.

For all those out there scarred by your past situations, my heart truly goes out to you.

I have been married over 15 years with a 6 year dating period before that (started dating in high school). Because we started so young together, there was never any yours/mine. We created joint accounts on banks, joint title, generally joint everything except individual Roth IRAs and 401ks. Everything we do financially is from a “household” perspective. I earn about 2.5x what he makes. His insurance is way better than mine, so we get insurance through his work even though it lowers his paycheck. Before we were earning enough to max out 401ks (which we both do now because that is our retirement together), we made sure we were dollar equitable instead of percent - rationale there is we either need the dollars or not so it is fair to look at the total population of dollars together. Everything else from our house payment, bills, funding our kids’ college funds, etc all comes out of the joint account and it makes no difference. Credit card is joint as well which is paid monthly from joint account.

The only thing we do that is more just to be “fun” is a “who pays for dinner game”. Whoever orders the higher dollar value pays (with the joint credit card). It is basically meaningless but reminds us of our time when dating. I tend to eat less so usually do not pay but if I order a fancy steak and wine and he gets a cheaper chicken and beer meal…you get the idea. We do that just to keep our lives fun because being married and together so long takes real work and finding those ways to remember how you fell in love are important even while you each grow and change.

Wishing you the best given your tough circumstance.

I earn 3x more than my partner and I pay more towards living expenses. I don't have any negative feelings about this. He quit a higher paying blue collar job to pursue a white collar career which will mean he has less physical stress on his body. Eventually his income may catch up to mine. It doesn't harm me at all to pay more of our overhead. I'm still saving and investing a lot of money and have enough to do fun things too.

My spouse makes more than me as a consultant. When we rented, we split rent and utilities 50/50. Now in our house we both put in 60% of our pay and it pays mortgage, utilities, and builds an emergency fund.

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How did this situation evolve? Is he still in school? Generally speaking couples should try to share costs equally without making a big deal about it. If there is an economic disparity (one partner earns much more than the other) then it might make sense to share costs in a different manner. However, there needs to be some discussion and understanding about what the relationship means. If one person is providing most of the money, then the other person provides [fill in the blank]. At the very least, have a chat about the money.

Before we were married it was proportionally. I make double what my partner makes and we both spent about 50% of our paychecks on our expenses. After we married everything goes into one pot. Its not my money vs their money anymore, it's ours and bills get paid and we budget the rest together

We contribute proportion to our incomes so if I make 80% of the combined income I pay 80% of the bills.

That’s a problem when you start to hate someone hate make you have a bad feeling instead look things without hate and look for better opportunities to improve, love is not always about money and hate its not love

You married him for better for worse, don't leave
Who do you want to leave him for?

IF you are married, there is no "their money" and "my money". It is "our money". How long have you been married, and how long has this been going on? have the two of you talked about money and finances?

If you don't have a budget, you need to start making one. The first few months can be difficult, but should get better over time.

If you are married, did the two of you talk about money before getting married?

Yes, Marriage is a “Work in Progress.” Communicate and share goals, joint bank accounts, recon review, and create realistic budget.

It's supposed to be that a married couple puts their money together, and pay for everything together. I'd consider divorce if your husband isn't going to meet you half way. One of the main reasons for divorce is financial problems, if he truly loves you, he wont play childish games with you. Sorry your going through this. Hope it gets better.

I do things differently with my partner. I like having money separately and I like being able to spend my own money without it having to come out of a joint account. We split bills based on our percentage of how much we make (for us is about 60/40%) and we document all our home+child expenses using this app called Splitwise. Whoever pays for a bill documents it there and then at the end of the month the person who paid the most gets reimbursed. The app lets you split things with your percentage. It works for us but other people might think it’s weird. Do whatever works for you guys!

I’m concerned for your marriage. Finances are hard in marriage (27 years for us). We do the joint bank account but if we weren’t doing that then I’d prefer to make a budget together and then have a specific amount that each of us could do with what we pleased, kind of like an equal allowance that we together would decide on. We have the joint account that everything goes into. Then we have separate accounts that we put our allowance or pocket money into.