Reasonable, genius or shitty...

[Coldemort]

Really cant make my mind up.

A friend of mine earns a comfortable wage. His partner is currently on a training contract so is on minimum wage. Not married, bought a house together about a year ago.

They've drawn up a list of 50/50 household chores. Great, both work full time, how it should be done. Hes paid for a cleaner to come in BUT only do his 'allocated' chores. On his night to cook he gets a dine in meal. He pays for ironing, but only when it's his week to iron.

I know I'm going to get the usual response of 'none of your business' but I'm intrigued by this. They have separate accounts, so if he wants to pay for it, she wants (has to) to it then fair enough I suppose.

Just seems very odd. And I think I'd have massive -illogical- resentment. 'Oh dont bother with the bathroom tonight, Doris will do it when she gets home'.

Obvs her name is not Doris....

To me, that relationship seems very sterile. There’s no give or take.
What happens if one is poorly during their ironing week, does the other partner have double, or do they swop weeks to make it fair.

I've suggested similar to my DH. That if he doesn't want to do his fair share of the domestic tasks then he is free to pay someone else to do it for him, but I won't pick up his slack just because I'm a woman.

If they were both on exactly equal salaries and for instance she loved to spend money on clothes and he wasn't bothered about spending much, I could understand it, but in that situation it's awful because the earnings balance is so unequal.

Presumably your friend is able to do the same if she chooses or can save money and do it herself if she prefers.

They won’t last very long. Probably quite resentful too.

My friend is the one on the high salary. She wouldn't be in a position to able to do this for at least a few years until her training contract ends.

I guess the illogical part is that she's not doing anymore than if he did it himself. Doesn't sit easy with me though!

No its very tit for tat and I would not want to live (or indeed be friends) with someone whose thinking is so inflexibly black and white

Shitty. My DP would either have paid a cleaner to do all our chores, or to do 50% and then split the remaining 50% in half with me. There's no way he would have paid for just his and then watched me work.

Well it doesn’t sound very... kind I suppose. I’m a SAHM and DH earns a high wage, I can’t imagine him happily seeing me run around loads of chores while he pays someone to do his share. The result is that he has far more leisure time than her, and that doesn’t sit well.
Having said that, when I was working and one of my chores was ironing, I paid someone to do it. We both earned exactly the same though so he had the option of outsourcing his chores too!

Shitty!

We have seperate accounts as well as joint and we pay the bills as a proportion of our salaries, so say both 60 percent, but that means one person is paying 70 percent and the other thirty.

I can't perceive a situation where we would have an ironing lady and a cleaner to do only one persons share, or split the bills fifty fifty when one earns more than the other,

Shitty way to live and not for me.

Imagine what they’re like in bed... probably spend more time negotiating than enjoying themselves...

Really, really selfish and shitty.

There's just no love in it, is there?

Tight bastard is the description I'd use.

I think you've put your finger on it there, LimpidPools. There's no love in it.

Awful.

Shitty! I've just read a book called fair play which is supposed to split chores equitably.

If dh only contributed to making his responsibilities easier, I'd be quite resentful. Especially as the fucker would probably be quite smug about it!

She best not have a baby with him. This is her warning sign to run away. So cold.

Glad it's not just me!!

Shitty.

Even if it's his money/ her money it is actually all still their money in total which only the lazy one is benefiting from.