to think we should encourage our daughters to marry men who earn AT LEAST as much as them?

[StripeyBear]

Quarter of a century ago, starting university, I would have furiously disagreed with this. Women should make their own money, and marry who they like!

Now, looking back, I'm not so sure. Nearly all my female friends, however successful in their careers prior to children, have compromised work success to raise their children. (I do have one friend who has a house husband, but that is the exception rather than the rule). Consequently, the lifestyle of my friends has been largely dictated by how much their husbands earn. So the nurse who married the mechanic is run ragged with extra shifts, juggling small kids in a tiny house with a large mortgage, indifferent schools and holidays in Haven or not at all - whilst my midwife girlfriend who married a consultant, is living in a huge detached house, with kids at private schools and just does a few shifts to keep her registration and to keep out of the way of her cleaner.

So AIBU, should we tell our daughters to marry someone who can provide the material stuff, or in another quarter of a century, will the world have moved on again, and fathers will be equal parents, and none of this will matter a stuff?

I cannot believe how many people seem to agree with the OP. I will be encouraging my dd's to enjoy life, to be whatever they want to be and to fall in love with whoever they like! Marrying someone for money is the most awful idea I have ever heard. What if this person becomes sick, loses their job, or has to take a huge pay cut? Do you trade them in for a higher earning model? There is so so much more to life than money! We grew up with not much money but had the most amazing childhood. We spent holidays as a family, my dad was a huge part of our lives. Myself and dh are financially better off, but the trade off is he works away, work always comes first and as a result my children won't have the same happy family memories that I had.

This thread is just so WRONG from so many points of view. There is so much more to life than money and I also bloody well hope that future generations will work out a way to manage families and income generation which doesn't put each parent in such stereotypical roles and under so much pressure.

ImperialBlether Sun 27-Jan-13 18:52:14
"I think it's silly to just ignore the type of job the man does. It's reasonable to want your child to marry someone who loves his job and who works willingly (ie not an idle bastard) and whose income (with hers) will allow them to make the most of their lives. I'd hate to see either of my children really struggling to make ends meet and to be unable to travel or to go out with friends."

But who defines "making the most of your life"? Beyond a bottom level where basic human needs for food and shelter are not being met, surely this is entirely subjective?

Who decides that our cheap holidays in France or the UK are less fulfilling than somebody else's holidays in the Maldives? Or that our smallish semi is a less happy place than somebody else's mansion?

Who decides whether dh and my hanging on to a job which pays relatively badly but is what we've always wanted to do is less "making the most of our life" than being able to go out with friends. My job makes me wake up with a smile in the mornings and I don't even particularly like going out with friends.

Is it for me to tell dd that you can't aspire to be an actress (which is the big interest of her life) because chances are you won't be able to travel or go out to expensive restaurants and that is more essential for your happiness? Says who?

Or to the contrary, should I tell her that she can't aspire to a well paid job that isn't what she dreamt of because that is something that would have made me very unhappy? She's not me!

The only sensible advice I have to give to my daugher (or son) is this:

Think about what you want out of life. Don't listen to what others tell you you should want, think about what you actually do want!

You can tell them whatever you like- however I can't imagine why you think they will actually listen to their mothers!!

If you read what I said properly, you will see I did stress getting a job that you love.

Of course I would prioritise that over a curry!

More than 1/3 of women who marry will have to deal with divorce. Maybe it would be more realistic to encourage our daughters not to aim for a fairytale but other realistic outcomes too?

If we educate our daughters to be able to work and provide for themselves throughout their lives, and to select a partner on the basis of shared values and ambitions in life, then the problem should be self-solving?

Encouraging women to think like golddiggers is less likely to produce good marital statistics.

I suspect mumsnet has a far higher proportion of SAHMs than society as a whole anyway.

Backtobedlam, I was pleasantly surprised how few people agreed with her!

It is perfectly legitimate to avoid prioritising material wealth in favour of spiritual / a job you love / experiences / whatever.

It is also perfectly legitimate for someone who sees that prioritisation to say 'actually no, that's not the life I want'. That's not grabbing, it's practical and avoids hurt on all sides.

YABU - love is more important than money OP!!

Having said that, if any single Billionaire Oligarches are reading this then do inbox thanks :)

Seriously one friend's hubbie digs holes in roads for a living, another is a security guard, one is a baker, & one is a postman.

My friends are all very working class, struggle for money but are far happier in their marriages than some wealthier couples i know of.

I think YABU (very). Sounds like something from centuries ago, when women couldn't easily earn their own living and had to depend on relatives to support them. I think allowing yourself to fall in love with someone because of the size of their wallet is inmoral and in my more radical, young days, I would have considered it to be a distant relative of prostitution. I think you ought to marry the person who is going to make you happy, encourage you to grow as a person through life and potentially be a good parent. Their wage package (especially in these days of redundancies, etc.) is meaningless in this context, as long as they want to do something with their time and they are not idling their life away. So being a house parent, a nurse, a volunteer or a business person, all fine by me - just as long as the other half truly loves you and support you. I have a DD and I would never encourage her to only love someone who can give her a more comfortable lifestyle. Yes, there may be challenges ahead, but if you are supported, you can overcome stuff...

Yes, Imperial, but you did also imply that the ability to travel and go out was something you would hate to see your children do without.

I am saying, that would depend entirely on the child and what they wanted out of life.

For me, to marry dh was absolutely the most important thing. Nothing mattered more than that. Secondly, that we should both be able to stay in our profession even if it didn't pay was very important. Having to struggle to make ends meet, not being able to travel or go out really didn't matter to us, because of the people we were. People are all different.

My dh's ridiculously high pay has held back my career, because my ridiculously relatively low pay means I'm the one who can work a four day week and who has turned down other opportunities because the hours would make childcare difficult. It's a bit of a poisoned chalice to have a high earning partner, though I fully appreciate not having to worry about money and having choices.

I have more education, expertise and passion for my work but he's on the gravy train so I sacrifice some of my ambition.

I married only for love though in any case, I made more money when I met dh and I didn't give it much thought. I think you just want your child to marry someone solvent who can contribute financially.

I will be encouraging my son to do what he loves, and, if he has dc, to fight for equal parental leave and be a good father.
I will also encourage him to marry a woman (or man) who wants to share responsibility for the breadwinning and the child rearing.

Well I shacked up with someone who was a bit of a waster and crap with money 'cos I was madly in love with him. Career wise I was a high flier, he was a lab technician. My more calculating friends were horrified. I resigned myself to never being loaded.
When we had DC1 I fell madly in love with him too and had a meltdown over going back to work. DP stepped up to the plate, found a work ethic I'd never imagined he posessed, got a job in sales where his considerable charm paid dividends and eventually started his own company. We are now fortuate to be quite wealthy and I got to be a SAHM for as long as I wanted.
And none of the so called high earners carefully picked by some of my friends earn anywhere near what DP does (and are pretty dull to boot).
I tell my daughters to pick someone kind and do what makes them happy.

The thing is that we are all, to some extent, trapped by our circumstances - especially once we have children.

Op's midwife-consultant-wife friend is trapped only doing the odd shift here and there because even if she had wanted to go all out, work full time and get to the top of her field, with such a high earning husband it would have been difficult to justify him fully doing his share with the children.

I am, and always have been, the higher earner in my marriage. Not by huge sums - I now work 3 days a week and earn just a fraction more than dh does working full time. But I am. I did manage to take the full year of maternity leave with dd and I will again this time when (apparently) ds is born in May. I can also work 3 days a week. It's been possible by the two of us discussing what we want long in advance and making plans to enable it to be so. In our case we spent our 20s overpaying like mad on the mortgage in order to minimise our outgoings long term.

The big advantage of my circumstances is that Lthough I only work 3 days my job is clearly not just a hobby and dh never treats it that way. He does more than his share with illness and pick ups on my working days - and obviously on my non working days I do all of that. So it works out pretty well for us both.

I will be encouraging dd and ds2b to marry someone they can't live without. Because whether you are holidaying in the Maldives or worrying about mortgage rates going up (and we've done both) it is better if you are doing those things with someone you love and who loves you.

I will also encourage them to think about those choices that they have made and their implications lo g before they ttc (if they choose to ttc). So if they are the main earner but want time off then make sure they have enough savings. If they are not the main earner but want to continue with their career to make sure that they are well respected in work so that they will get some flexibility when needed. And to make sure that the person they are ttcing with has the same long term plans and desires that they do.

Oh dear... sorry to disappoint/depress some of you

Posters here can be a bit too literal. I wasn't really looking for advice on specific mother-daughter chats with my own off-spring - but using it a framework to think through women's position in the labour market/family, looking back 25 years to when I was a teenager and how I viewed the world, and looking forward another 25 years to when our children might be making similar choices. I really don't think it is akin to suggesting prositution as a valid career path

Cory I see what you're getting at - but I think the difference is that women have children, and hugely want to be the parent who cares for them. OK, that is a little bit of a generalisation, and I know there are some women who find looking after babies and small children very boring, and they can't wait to return back to work full-time - but they do tend to be the exception - and most mothers limit their work when their children are born. And it's not because they can't afford childcare - really, it isn't. Women want to be with their little babies (even if they dont' breastfeed). And they want to be with them when they are sick too usually - it is a matter of biology.

I have noticed that none, or maybe very few, have actually said that they will encourage their DSs to marry high earning women.

op, with respect, the subject headline does not really match what you have just said.
Like someone else has said, are you writing an essay?

I don't think you're being entirely unreasonable.

For a start people tend to do this anyway, well at least middle class women are unlikely to pair up with someone with considerably lower earning potential.

I think people who respond with "marry for love" have a slightly unrealistic and overly romantic view of marriage. How many people can genuinely say they married the love of their life? There are lots of people we can love deeply, but I do think when people are deciding who they want to commit to they do factor in other issues like shared values, life stage and yes attitude to money. How many people have filtered someone out as "not boyfriend material" because of their career etc? Life is easier if you have a financial cushion, I'm not sure it's horribly materialistic not to take this into account when making massive life choices like marriage.

And incidentally I've seen numerous threads here where posters have been encouraged to leave a partner who is massively in debt. At what point between having £10K on the credit card and £100,000 in the bank does it become acceptable to think about money?

Alittlestranger - surely most people marry the love of their life?

Amillionyears I wish more posters would encourage their sons to earn high earning women. Because at the moment a lot of men still unfortunately have issues with a woman they see as higher paid/more intelligent/more ambitious than them.

Meadow2, I genuinely do wonder if that is the case. I think we marry the person who seems like the best approximation at the time we were ready to do it.

I definitely didnt do that, and did marry the love of my life.I am not the kind of person to turn someone down based on their job though.

My mother encouraged my sisters and I to have a career so that we would always be able to support ourselves. She was a very wise woman.
She also told us to marry our best friend.

At no point did she mention money.

One of my sisters and I have always earned more than our DHs. My youngest sis has been critical about this arrangement in the past particularly when my BIL was out of work. She was never worried about living off her own DH when she was out of work though. ( She has no DC)

So many women have double standards regarding income.
Does it really matter who earns what and how the roles are divided in a relationship.