Higher earner’s contribution to house/kids/mental load

DH earns at least 15 times as much as me, often more depending on bonus. I wfh pt (about 10 hrs). He works in the office 5 days and gets the dcs up and dressed in the mornings, and gives them breakfast and takes eldest to school (5 min walk). He is home by 5.30pm and we eat dinner together, and we take turns doing evening tasks like bath, bedtime (usually one child each), homework, prepping snack bag for school. At weekends he doesn't work and we spend most days together on days out, and take turns ferrying dcs to activities or parties. He takes the rubbish out and we take turns doing laundry. We split different financial tasks. He tends

I do all school and nursery pickups, cooking, online grocery shop, weekday ferrying to clubs, admin for clubs, instrument practice, planning trips out and holiday camps, cleaning, sorting clothes and educational supplies. I have responsibility for the dcs during school holidays, although they often use activity clubs which run in school hours. Youngest is in morning preschool only so I look after her in the afternoons.

I'm happy with the split. I wouldn't want a ft pressured job, and I will have more time to myself when the dcs are both in ft school and holiday camps.

I see lots of who has the more important job and who hates their job more, as ours for not contributing equally. Just because you have a job you enjoy and presumably your DP has a job he hates or indifferent to, doesn’t mean you need to do more work around the house. Unless of course you’re telling him he can’t possibly change his job and find something he enjoys.

It doesn’t really matter what anyone else does because we all have different setups, different commutes, different levels of flexibility and different levels of support (bought in or family). You’re asking because you feel it’s unfair. So what would feel fair to you within what works for your setup? It might not be possible for him to take on more of the childcare/school stuff due to his hours, so what can he do in terms of housework or admin? Being in charge of swimming etc can be done in the evening. I feel like the reason you’re asking if because you’re expecting your DP to have some misogynistic answer about earning more and contributing more to the household? So actually it’s probably better to ask him why he doesn’t value raising your shared children as a contribution to the house and family.

Working full time hours, even if you was on minimum wage, you must earn +£22k so if your husband is earning just under 20 times that amount he must be on over +£400,000 a year!? You could have a cleaner, chef, gardener and nanny for all that surely, even in London/South East before someone says it! 🤣

I can’t imagine doing your own laundry when your household income is half a million annually!!

My DH earns 3 times what I earn, both FT. I WFH twice a week sometimes 3 days, he WFH 1 day a week, he also works longer hours and often has to do more work when he gets home.

on his WFH he does school runs, takes DD to her swimming lesson although only for the last few weeks as her session changed and will probs change again after the summer holidays
on my WFH day, I do school run and a diff club, I also manage my time and get all laundry done on my wfh days (hanging the washing out while the kettle boils takes the same time as making a brew round and having a chat in the kitchen at the office)
whoever isn’t wfh does the nursery runs

DH also cooks more than me but I do all admin (household, personal, children)food shopping, laundry, cleaning in between our cleaner who comes every other week, all parties, I do more homework and dance practice with DD in the house but we do a child each at bedtime if we are both in
DH also does DIY and garden although he has outsourced some of this to a gardner
when DS starts clubs DH will probably have to do more clubs if we have clashes

but we are happy with our split and both get as much leisure time as we want

The answer on here tends to be that everybody’s work is equally important so you should evenly split housework, childcare, take turns dealing with sick kids who suddenly can’t be in school so somebody has to miss work.

But for us DH earns way way more than I ever could - he is a very high earner and his salary pays for our lifestyle. I work part-time and enjoy making my own “fun money” but it’s not really relevant to our family finances.

So it would never make sense to endanger his job by making him miss important meetings or be too tired to function well, realistically even though we both work his job just is more important. That means I miss work when needed, and I do almost everything around the house with him stepping in when he can.

So I think you have to be realistic about whose job is more important!

I agree with others that earnings shouldn't come into it and it's about equal time to yourself and sharing the load.

However, I think the exception to this is if you are earning so little, at a job you love (and might do anyway), so the job effectively becomes a hobby. So, if you're not earning at least minimum wage at your job, I think you need to reassess.

I acknowledged that by asking if it was a choice.

People don’t just work cos they need to!

Otherwise we’d all be in finance..

Hmm we kind of see it that parenting is unrelated to financial contribution. I’m not sure how the 2 relate really. I earn probably 10-15% of what DH earns (hard to say as I’m self employed and DH’s annual take home can vary too). I was a SAHM for 8 years - whenever DH was not working, parenting was equal.
Now I’m back at work, DH does at least 3 bedtimes a week as I’m at work, and tbh he does some when I’m home too as I’m sat on the sofa/cleaning/cooking etc. DH does about half of the school drops and pick ups. He doesn’t need me to like leave meals or tell him what to cook etc. He packs the kids bags every night (I don’t because I think they should do it themselves 😆 DH cba with the last minute frantic stress before school). He gets bday presents for parties etc. It just is what it is, active parenting and wanting to spend time with your children.

We were fairly equal earners but I don’t think it matters - the end result should be that you get equal time off.

It helps to divide whole areas eg I do laundry, you do shopping and cooking, I do sports kit, you do packed lunches etc.

I am concerned you call him your DP - are you not married? If not you are financially unprotected so please get married, it’s madness not too as the lower earner parent.

Also, unless he is really loaded (and you are married) don’t leave it too long before you go back to decently paid work, or again, you will be a poor old lady and that will be no fun.

Do you choose to work full time? With him earning such a huge amount I'm surprised you need to.

If you’re not married, can you afford to just work part-time?

Do you jointly own your home and any equity within it?

How much are you putting into your savings and pension?

Because all this time you’re ploughing 90% into parenting, you’re not freeing up time/energy to be earning, but your DP is. If he decides he wants to split tomorrow, would you both leave the relationship with equal financial status (house equity, savings, pension etc?) or would he have considerably more because you’ve been taking on the childcare burden?

Agree with above re free time. Does your dh 'love' his job like you do yours?
Is yours more of a life-style business so no challenges or stress, pick/what you do?

Why have you allowed him to undermine your earning capacity and financial independence?

hes Taking the absolute piss. You’re doing all the child rearing whilst he increases his earning potential and doesn’t pull his weight at home and you’re not even married.

start working full time and make him do half.

I work full time from home in a pretty undemanding job, husband work v long hours in a very stressful job and earns 3 times what I do.

I do everything for our disabled DS and also everything housewise. I do have a cleaner and gardener though. I am chronically ill and my parents who are 5 mins away are needing more and more from me.

Some days I feel like I can’t cope but I just power through as I feel I should earn while I can. I will be relying on DH in retirement as I gave up my high earning career as we couldn’t both be away after DS came along.

I have a pension but nothing like what his is worth and we are older so no time to save more. If I need anything he will give me the money but I do sometimes think he is spoiled and that I carry the mental load. But I choose to stay and we have been through a lot.

I don’t think he appreciates me BUT I do know I could not do this completely by myself. I was brought up to shoulder the burden as a woman. I’m still better off than my sister who has an unemployed addict for a DH.

Both high earners but DH earns three times me. Both work in the City 3 days a week and 2 days at home.

DH does more of the ferrying around to various activities. I do more of the school drop
offs (because he does pick up and off to football/swimming/tennis). I do more of the mental load of organising presents/booking holidays/arranging social stuff/online food order. DH does all the practical stuff in the house and garden and the household utilities and finances.

We both feel like we are equal in terms of sharing the load. Tbh when I was part time the main difference was I did more childcare and now I’m FT DH has had to step up on that front.

How old are your kids? I have 4 children. But 3 are teens and youngest is 10. They need us much less now than 10y ago.

The answer is: Equal. Leisure. Time

How much time do you get to sit and watch TV? Scroll on your phone? Have a bath? Do something you enjoy?

It doesn't need a number, it needs a compariso to DH.

Im an assistant headteacher. I leave home at 6.40am, do not stop all day, and get home 7pm ish. DH works from home full time, flexible business hours. DH therefore has more time for the children term time than I do. In school holidays it swaps because I have more time for the children.

You still haven't said how many hours a week your partner works. I'll assume normal office hours.So that means he's working two hours a day, more than you. Across the course of the week, that amounts to ten hours. So I think you should be doing ten hours of childcare, housekeeping and mental load before he has to do any. Anything not done in those ten hours should be split equally between the two of you

In school holiday time, you should be doing 35 hours of these tasks before he has to do any. Anything above thirty five hours should be split equally.

I find your final comment about keeping track strange as the whole point of your thread actually is about keeping track of these hours.

You should have around equal leisure time. So sounds like he should be doing a little more.

50/50 when we aren’t working. Dh is self employed working FT and under normal circumstances I usually work about 80% (5 days, roughly school hours). I think that is similar to you. (At the moment, I’m off work due to cancer).

If I’m the one home, I do the kids and the house. So I do the school run, afternoon snacks, getting ready for any activities. Then Dh gets home and he’ll run them to all their activities, while I sort dinner. We eat dinner, Dh gets them in the shower/bath and dressed for bed. I do bedtime, he does all the tidying up, dishes, takes the dog out and puts her to bed.

We each have our jobs we do: I do the food shopping and Dh mows the lawn (it’s a big lawn), trims hedges, most garden care. I do most of the cooking, but he does all the tidying up and dishes. I do most school runs, but he does most of the driving to activities. He does most of the bills and dealing with things like sending in meter readings and the bins. I tend to do all the school admin, ordering school lunches, sorting costumes for the school play, buying new school shoes.

Particularly since I’ve been unwell, Dh does a lot of facilitating weekend fun so I can rest. Last weekend he took both dc camping. This weekend, he’s taken one on a cycling trip. It gives me a chance to sit down and rest on the weekends.

Obviously, if one of you works longer hours, the other one has to pick up the lack in the hours when they are the only parent at home. But when both of you are home, you should both be getting stuck in. Unless you’re a surgeon working 20 hour shifts, no one is so important and so tired that they can’t parent and run a household in their off hours, no matter how much money they make.