this is really bugging me. I am from a fairly normal working class not at all well off probably poorish background. My parents loved me but had nothing so I never got anything from them once I left home. When I was at home doing summer jobs (as a student) my mum would ask for £10 a week (in the 70s) towards my 'keep'. I never got pocket money. If I wanted something I had to work for it (I got my first p/t job at 13 and worked all through school and college). My mum used to make up my grant (about £30 a term was what they had to pay) out of the money I gave her in the summer. My last year at college my dad refused to fill in the application forms so I didn't get a grant that year at all and I had to work 2 days a week to pay rent, eat etc. Incidentally I came out of college with a few hundred pounds in savings. Two days after my finals I got a job and have worked ever since.
I have no beef about this at all - I think it was 'normal' for my family and most of my peers, there were a few people I knew whose parents had more money but really very few.
I am now married to a lovely dh (not our first marriages) and we have 3 kids between us. I came along when his were 2 & 4 and ours was born about a year later.
First is due to go to Uni in 2011 ad it has suddenly become apparent to me that dh is expecting to fund in full her education - ie at least £10k a year for the 4 year degree, then do the same for the next one and then the next. I have always kind of known this but hadn't ever realised he was planning to wholly find it, not just 'top it up'.
And then, last weekend we had a real argument about the kids cars - dsd has juststarted driving lessons and will want a car. He blithely said, 'we'll have to buy her one' and still later 'we need to look into how we can help them all out with deposits when they want to buy a house'.
Now I am totally and utterly gobsmacked by this. He does come from a different background from me. Privately educated, Oxford Uni and he had help from his very comfortably off parents at various stages. He thinks this is normal. I think it is totally and utterly abnormal.
You need to know that we do not have much money at all - he doesn't earn loads and I lost my job last year and have struggled to find alternatives, he will probably get made redundant next year - and his payout will not be huge. We are always overdrawn and live paycheck to paycheck despite our best endeavours.
AIBU - please tell me, what do you think - are you all planning to impoverish yourselves to give your dc's money?