My money, his money and our money for dolls

My husband and I are of the "our money" rolls. We both work, he makes more than me, but we have a joint account. We both, with each paycheck, for lack of a better term, get an "allowance" to do with how we want. If there's something huge we want to get, like a doll for me, or a set of D&D books for him, we check the balance, and if we can, forgo our "allowance" for the next few months, equivalent to the price. It's worked out well so far. Also helps both of us to budget accordingly. I got Jay Say by giving up almost 4 months of "allowance". That meant no going out to eat on my dime, no energy drinks on Fridays, etc. It takes out the little things that we kind of tend to take for granted until you add it up at the end of the week and realize you've spent 20 or 30 bucks on them.

It's worked out really well so far, and it's helped me get out of a huge amount of debt that I was in before I met him. I'm pleased by it, and it makes me appreciate the dolls more, to be honest, when I have to give everything else up to get them.

Also, though, when it comes to our extra stuff (he works a second job occasionally on the weekends, I get art commissions on occasion)... That money is each of ours, to be added onto our "allowance" to do with what we will. I got a few commissions before Christmas, and was able to use the money for doll stuff. His second job money went to a new microphone for his computer and Runes of Magic cards (like WoW, only... cheaper. XD)...

Working well for us. We also get our bills paid and we're chipping away at our debts. He's a budgeting King.

 

I suspect it's because a doll is not considered something that "adults" want. Many people think it's perfectly fine for an adult to blow a lot of money on the things you listed, or on expensive clothing or electronics such as an audio system, big screen TV or pay-per-view. But buying a doll is weird.

There also seems to be more resistance for a lot of people when the money is leaving the house in one large sum rather than in dribs and drabs. People can handle someone spending five dollars on cigarettes or Starbucks lattes or whatever each day for two months, far more than they can handle someone giving those things up and spending the 300 dollars accrued on something in one fell swoop. It reminds me of my mom giving me 50 cents a week as a child and then being angry if I saved it up till I had 10 dollars, rather than just spending the 50 cents every week on candy or a comic book. She didn't see 50 cents a week as that big of a deal but when it was all put together and made up 10 dollars it was more money than she might have in her purse.

 

Time to say "Sayonara baby" And show him the door. Or better yet get out the door yourself.

I can't honestly fathom allowing someone to tell me I CAN'T spend my spare money how I want. I'd be handing him his keys and texting his momma to expect him shortly.

 

Ah, money, the best way for couples to gnaw at each other, no? ;-D Srsly, I think if two people can sit down and talk it out, fears, plans, goals, everything, then everything can work out. It almost goes without saying that both sides have to be honest.

I've been with my partner for nearly 22 years and we kept our finances separate until we purchased our condo. That is one reason we're still together. The other is that we talk about and negotiate everything.

We currently have a household checking account that covers the big expenses (mortgage, utilities, credit card payments, etc.) where the majority of our income is direct deposited. In addition, we each have a separate checking account which we get an allowance, if you will, each month. We can use our allowance on basically whatever we want (after groceries). Most of the time, it buys the latest Doctor Who dvds, puts gas in the car, takes us to dinner and movies.

We rarely put purchases on credit cards and when we do, pay them off each month and for those exceptions (like vacations and family emergencies), no more than three months.

We have shared and separate hobbies, which we respect (even if we may not understand the others interest). We talk about making a major purchase, even if it is with our 'allowance'. Major meaning anything over $100 (yeah, we're old and even after a mortgage we still think $100 is a lot. go figure). He was nervous about my 'very expensive doll habit' but has made suggestions for making and selling doll clothes.

 

On the tangent of small amounts building up, I figured recently that if you spend $1000 on dolls in a year (which might be one fullset, a doll and a bunch of clothes, a pack of pukis, whatever, it's just a round figure to work from), it works out to less than $20 a week. I don't know about everyone else, but it's very easy for me to blow through that amount in a week without even thinking about it (granted I live in Australia where things are more expensive, but even if I think back to living in the US, I could easily spend more than that on a couple of lunches out, some bottled juices, a few comics, etc).

I was actually surprised how much money I saved when I stopped buying a bottle of soda and a chocolate bar every day at the bus station (though I cut them out more because it's unhealthy junk food than to save money). Similarly, I probably save nearly $50 a week bringing lunch in from home instead of eating lunch out every day like I used to (serious money-sink). It's not that hard to spend a doll's worth of money on all the little things in life, but of course it's more daunting to spend $500 one time on a big luxury item than $5 100 times on little luxury items (fancy coffees, magazines, cocktails, cigarettes, you name it).

 

wow thats harsh! if u ever get an allowance, etc, make a piggy bank account out of that i did that when i still lived with my parents, and VOILA! ^^

 

Joy comes with freedom to express yourself, if any guilt is added the joy is sucked out.
We do a joint thing and then have our own totally private accounts for our leftovers. He never asks whats in my account I don't ask what's in his, though he loves to tell me how much he's saved (this is not to guilt trip me on my saving). He loves to save it makes him happy that makes me happy too though I try to encourage him to spend on something once in a while for himself like decent music headphone or whatever. He is a man of few needs it seems! me though I have my art supplies, canvases, oils, pastels, acrylics, ..... Dolls! he really doesn't mind all he cares about is if I am happy. its a very good marriage with NO argueing about money. However if he was to question every thing that comes in the mail no it wouldn't work, and i wouldn't allow it. A controlling husband is just not ok with me, life is too short you need to decide if you want to have that constant nag.

As far as a partner really obsessing about that doll! it is a sign of anger and frustration being placed on a tangable object. I doubt its really about the doll same thing with parents.

 

1. I also don't believe in compensation for doing necessary things (laundry, dishes, cleaning, etc). It's part of keeping up your living area. It's your job. IMO getting money for cleaning is like getting money for breathing. I would be insulted if my husband gave me $20 because I vacuumed the living room.

2. Like others have said, it's about respect and transparency. I'm transparent about my dolls: I plan what I want in advance, I budget for it, etc. He respects and trusts me and my decisions. And vice versa.

3.

This. This this this this THIS. Unless you jump in my shoes and earn my money, you have no right dictating what I can and can't do with it. You need to get yourself out the door ASAP.

 

Ladies! let us not begin another thread like the chinese doll one!

Each to their own! there are households that function one way and that is FINE!. I personally dont believe my husband HAS to dictate what i do, nobody EVER needs to dictate. A suggestion and a little chat is always nicer than having a general at home! ^^ I think that , as adults, and not the teen population of this forum, we are quite lucky not to have nagging mothers and fathers giving us allowances. I do keep a little pig piggy bank in my kitchen, n which as soon as a new year starts we start putting £2 per day, for each 365 days of the year. Sometime we keep a piggy bank each, and that money saved becomes the "Big treat" money, which can be for household expenses (decoration), goodies, or for more practical bill payments.

 

agreed, i HATE people in my money business. i'm rather good at budgeting (unlike my husband) and as long as bills are paid FIRST everything left gets split into savings and 'fun money.' though, unlike you, we do talk about purchases that are over 25$ because he doesn't know how to give me receipts XD

 

That's exactly how it is with my household. I do all the fiances and budgeting. We have money to spend on fun things after the bills get paid off first.

 

But that's what we're talking about: family members (and sometimes friends) dictating what you should and shouldn't do with your/our/whatever money. And when one spouse starts demanding what the other spouse can/can't do the marriage can go downhill quickly. Are you really saying:

Is OK because "to each their own"? Perhaps something isn't coming across correctly, but that sounded an awful lot like a threat to me.

Anywho, as others have said, as long as the essentials are paid I don't see what the big deal is. Your hobbies are your hobbies. Just because your hobby is different (and possibly more expensive) than your partner's hobby doesn't make it worse.

 

I'm actually quite upset with this thread. It seems like there are people here whose life partners have serious control issues. The "if you spend our money on a doll that will be the last cent you'll ever spend" guy in particular makes me shudder.

In 20 years of marriage, my husband Richie and I managed to negotiate these rough seas well by being transparent and discussing every purchase we were going to make, either separately or together. I was the geeky one with the gadgets and the computer upgrades. He was the musician who would make the occasional musical instrument purchase. When he got ill, things changed because he could not teach music any longer. I was already cutting back because I was back at school full time, but the cancer sandbagged us both.

In the good times, even when I wasn't the geldmacher in the family and he was, we both got the little things we individually wanted. It would just be discussed and budgeted. There actually was a period when I was making money in IT and my hubby was able to be a full time musician and music teacher. Then he began making good money as a music teacher, just in time for the Dot Com Crash to send me into unemployed hell. We had a great division of chores: I would cook most of the time, and he would clean up after me. We both handled the laundry. He was better at tidying up in the house. I managed finances and made sure the bills were paid. He'd drive me to the store but I'd deal with the actual shopping. And we would never play the game of who was doing more in the house. "Love means never having to say 'we're even' " was the way Richie would put it.

Really, the thing about control issues is that they can escalate to abusiveness. Threats are NEVER OK.

Another issue here is that caregiving and keeping the house are very devalued in our culture. "Women's Work" is considered her duty, and is taken for granted. Japan has a problem with women working outside the home after marriage and childbearing, and that is partially responsible for the rise in "parasite single" women who opt out of the traditional roles in favor of working, not marrying, and usually still living with her parents. However, they genuinely value the effort a traditional wife puts into the home, and she is also entrusted with managing the home and the family money. She gets the paycheck. He gets an "allowance." She pays bills and manages the necessities of life. It's somewhat different than the Western model of the one-paycheck household.

The notion that women should be paid for their housework and caregiving is something that arose out of the peculiarities of American one paycheck households. Again, in the West, "Women's Work" has not been given value. In a society so focused on wealth and enterprise, the kind of value given a traditional wife and mother in Japanese society is not given here. During the '70s second-wave feminists suggested that an objective value be placed on household tasks, and wives be paid accordingly out of their husband's paychecks. A vestige of that argument is the yearly salary survey done of domestic worker costs and how much "value" a traditional wife is worth. Actually Salary.Com, the site that does employment salary surveys, has set up a "wizard" online to determine the worth, in comparable domestic worker costs, of a housewife's labor:

http://swz.salary.com/momsalarywizard/htmls/mswl_momcenter.html

Even if a woman works outside the home in the US, she often faces a "second shift" coming home. The above wizard also can calculate how much the unpaid labor a woman does in the household, without assistance from her Significant Other, would cost if "help" were hired to do it.

Ultimately, men pitching in and helping with work in the household is a good thing. Even if a woman is not employed outside the home. Recent sociological studies suggest that men who pitch in more with chores get more sex. And a man who, during courtship, offers to pitch in and help with chores tends to "seal the deal" and get married more than the guy who sits on the couch and watches football all day. More egalitarian relationships tend to last longer than relationships where there is an imbalance of power. The fact that my husband and I had 20 very good years of marriage before the multiple myeloma took him is but one example of this.

So yeah, finances are deadly to a bad relationship. And when they become proxies for power and control issues...watch out.

 

I don't like the idea of 'compensation' for household duties in a direct sense, such as 'because I cleaned the house this week, I get an extra $200 spending money', or something similar. A system like that might work for some people, but I would hate it. I feel that the household duties are to be shared between those in the household. I approach this from a two-spouse household, since that's what I live in, but obviously it could work for three roommates, a parent and and adult child, etc, with some tweaking.

However, when I read the original post, I interpreted the meaning as less direct compensation and more an idea that stay-at-home members of a household should not have to feel beholden to the working members of a household, or to feel that their contributions are worthless when compared to the earning contributions of another member. I happen to prefer a fairly hands-on approach to finances within my marriage (ie: we avoid making big purchases without consulting each other and we have essentially joint accounts), but I think having separate accounts can work fine too, as long as everything is equitable. It's the idea that 'I earn the money so I can spend it however I want, but you stay at home, so you don't deserve to spend money on yourself,' that annoys me. Unless the stay-at-home partner is eating bonbons and watching soap operas all day, the division of labor within the relationship has been agreed upon by both partners, and both partners' contributions ought to be respected both in terms of actual respect given, and in terms of autonomy and power within the relationship.

I should add that I think this should definitely apply both ways, so those of us who want to spend $500 on a doll every other month should not complain about our partners wishing to spend $500.00 every other month on motorcycle parts, or painting supplies, or video games, or theater shows, or whatever else rocks their world. And if the joint budget can't handle both of these spending habits, I don't think there's anything wrong with either party calling the other on it, and working together to figure out a more reasonable spending level. Communication is pretty essential.

 

In case u havent noticed, i am saying that nobody in the forum has the right to say anything about households, the "each to their own" is just a simple was of saying: ladies respect each poster's life and home and spouse.

Secondly, your money, your life, COOL! , but to have people questioning what you do with what is clearly yours, is NOT cool. After all, if everything is fine economically, then why question one's hobbies? I have seen households go down hilld with partners being unreasonable. There is alot of criticism, but if you think about it stuff like PS3, Xbox, and games are not cheap either, and i have seen quite mature men going totally bonkers with obsession for thse things. One of the most ridiculous things i ever hear once during a pre-birth class was : We earn £1000 p/m but my hubby gives me £100 allowance every month, he expects me to make it last and likes to look at receipts.

Now THAT is the extreme of the extreme!

 

SO IN A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT DIRECTION:

I have my paycheck, my boyfriend has his, and as long as the bills are paid, we don't care how the rest of the money is spent. (We have a rainy-day fund, but after a while, we went "Okay. We're good. Let's buy some toys.) I buy ridiculously expensive dolls, he buys three CDs a week, I swear, and we both can't go near the mall without buying six Transformers, eight books and a videogame or three between the two of us. We're really bad, but we're bad together. (And I make sure I can cover the bills, because I love my boyfriend but he has this thing with money.)

If anyone else gives me crap about spending more on a doll than on my car (I drive a crappy car) I point them towards Louis Vuitton purses. That ends 90% of arguments.

Now, on the flip side, I'm bipolar, so anytime I spend more than fifty bucks (this is an arbietary number, really), I check with my boyfriend to make sure I'm not going on a manic spending spree. But that has everything to do with manic behavior and nothing to do with money.

Going completely OT here, finances are one way abusive people keep control -if you don't have the money to leave, you can't. (been there, done that, got the T-shirt) Without speculating or judging, the number for the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1.800.799.SAFE (7233) and their website is http://www.ndvh.org/. That's for America, but I know England also has such an organization, patronized by Patrick Stewart.

 

Violence is never the answer. Most of us here, i think, are fine with a joint account and then our individual accounts anyway. What happens to our individuals is our problem, but the joint is the engine that keeps the house going ^^

 

I grew up in a household where my finances, even at an early age, had to be part of the family finances simply to keep a roof over our head and food on the table. There's nothing like handing over your birthday money so your mother can buy your sister sneakers to break one's spirit when you're 10. After losing my mother and being shuffled around to various family members, I often had to do all of the household chores for everyone as I was told it was earning my keep.

Experiencing all of that has left me with the very firm belief that I will NEVER allow anyone access to my money, be they friend, family member, or significant other, and I will never allow someone to have financial power over me ever again. Thus, I would never do a joint account and should I end up with a SO, it will be one that thinks along the same lines where my money is my money to be spent how I see fit, and their money is their money with equal contributions from both towards shared expenses. I just would not be able to operate any other way.