To ask how much your OH makes so you can be a SAHP?

[justasliver]

Curious. How much does your DH (or DW!) make in order for you to stay at home and not be skint at the end of the month? I don't know how couples do it!

ET - really? Your DH earned as much as you when you were a trainee? I thought he was a teacher.

Anyway, generally with you regarding your posts here.

Yes. We didn't have a baby the first year I was a trainee solicitor - wage was £6250 a year. Second year I eanred £7500 and he was head of department in a private school. Our childcare cost whatever £7500 after tax was in those days. Then the year late when the baby was 1 I qualified and my salary jumped to £10,500

Dh earns around £40k before tax. We live comfortably. But we try to be sensible with money. So we always second/third guess ourselves before a big purchase.

Ah that makes sense - I assumed (don't know why really) that he was a trainee teacher at the time.

silentbat I do agree with your points.

However, it is also advantageous for the working partner to have a SAHP as they then don't have to take time out to do the breakfast club/school runs, after school club and friend date drop off/ pick ups not to mention housework. All the working couples I know share these responsibilities to some extent regardless of whether they have GP help, as they both have other demands on their time. DH job has come above everything ( though he would have liked to be able to be around more) and we have benefited financially from that.

If free/reduced cost childcare was available, we would have benefited financially from the second salary though it may have affected DHs career progression if he had needed to be regularly involved with domestic life = negative financial impact. Obviously that shouldn't be the case in this day and age but I don't expect I am the only one on this thread whose DH needs to put his job first. He's in finance.

Reading Windy's post is sobering, I know a couple of women that age in that position though I don't know if they would have been much better off had they stayed married and they are certainly both much happier single.

(He is 6 years older so owned a house and sold that and changed jobs to move hundreds of miles for my career as plenty of men did 30 years ago and do today for their wives' careers)

I thought the top income tax rate in the UK is 45% not 50% clearly missing point of thread

When my son was born in 1990 my husband must have been on around £50,000. I can't remember what I was earning, I think around £35,000. I never considered not working. I think we paid a nanny about £15,000 and I went back to work full time after 2 months.

Interesting thread. My DH earns just over £50k and we have three DCs between us, one of whom has just left home and is earning in her gap year. I am not earning atm and we are finding it tough (big mortgage in SE). I was self -employed for many years as a single parent but since moving in with DH have worked only part-time in very temporary jobs. Now looking for a 'proper' job and finding it really difficult as have been out of the 'workplace' - i.e. Paid employment - for 12 years. Can't go back to what I was doing before for various real sons. Am also 54 now and employers are wondering why i want a job that is , supposedly, 'beneath' me and question whether I would get bored or find it challenging enough. I have a DS who needs quite a lot of support at school - at least for the next 3 years (he's 13) so don't want a stressful job with long hours yet. I do regret being out of the workplace but just have to battle on and keep looking. I would have NO financial independence at all if DH left me which is very worrying!

(blue unfortunately national insurance at 2% is payable too so that brings 45% to 47% which is basically is therefore the upper rate of tax/NI - so half your income is confiscated by Big State; then if you earn over a certain amount you don't get the single person tax allowance of over £11k which everyone else does so some arguethat makes the upper marginal rate something like 63% at particular income levels if you factor that in but I wouldn't bother as it complicates it -basically it's 47% so about half. Far far far too high. We need it nearer 20% for all for tax and NI. Even the circa 33% tax/NI lower earners pay is too high and that is our lowest rate of income tax/NI)

No it is not 47%, you get the same free tax allowance as everyone else.

Just wondering about the idea that people go downhill when they retire? Does this apply to those in physical jobs as well. I know a woman who has retired at 54. Her job involved lots of bending over and her back was getting worse and worse. Her back is much better since she retired.

brasty I think this is a sampling bias i.e. most people who retire are older, they often retire BECAUSE they are feeling tired/unwell. I don't think retiring makes you ill.
My dad retired from teaching at 50 and died at 79 having pursued a new career in art dealing.

Yes I suspect you are right. My mum retired early, she has very bad arthritis that makes life difficult, and has got worse since she retired.

brasty So sorry for your mum. But it probably would have been much, much worse for her had she stayed. Hopefully it will calm down for her with lots of TLC

DH runs his own business so earns anywhere from 30-60k per year. I "work" for him so on paper I earn but not really any amount, more of a tax break.

We manage as I watch what we spend and cut where I can although it doesn't feel as though we are scrimping. Certainly don't really go short at all.

We have 2 dc who are 10 and 13.

Both of us together bring home €38k a year that's just about enough if I were to leave work we would be down €200 a week which is food shopping dance lessons swimming lessons and scouts trips to cinema mac Donald's so we would be hungry and have 2 bored children☺

I was a SAHP for 10 years. DH was self employed and we never knew what he was going to bring home. We managed because I budgeted and used 'nearly new ' shops. I now have 3 very well adjusted hard working grown up offspring.

Interesting thread. It all depends on your outgoings and lifestyle.

H is self-employed so our income varies every year. Last year he made around £700,000 which sounds like an eye-watering amount of money, BUT...

After tax that's around £400,000

We are in a long-running legal battle which cost us about £100,000 in legal fees last year so now we are left with around £25,000 a month

Monthly expenses:
Private school fees & nursery for 3 DC + DSS: £5,000
Rent: £6,500
Maintenance to exW: £6,000
Child maintenance for DSS to ExW: £2,500
Two cars/live-in nanny/DC activities etc: £3,000

That's £23,000 already.

Doesn't go very far.

If exW remarries or has more children then we will get to stop paying her £6,000 spousal maintenance a month. But who would when you have such a great deal, right? (Yes, I'm bitter)

It's all relative OP. Every family and every situation is different.

£25k a month doesn't go very far?

Absolutely. But you could shave £8km instantly by dropping schools and nannies.

brasty, Im not wrong Over 150k there is no single person allowance under English law and although the highest rate of income tax is indeed 45% you also pay 2% NI so effectively it's 47%. I can agree with you that NI is not tax (although in practice it's the same) but where do you get it that everyone has the single person allowance?

Income over £100,000

Your Personal Allowance goes down by £1 for every £2 that your adjusted net income is above £100,000. This means your allowance is zero if your income is £122,000 or above.
www.gov.uk/income-tax-rates/income-over-100000

I don't need people to weep for us higher earners. We are both very lucky and usually particularly hard working and prepared to do things those who earn less are not. Anyone else on here worked until they went into labour and been back at work full time after 2 weeks - thought not.... my choice. But I do think people have no idea of the huge extra tax burdens put on higher earners in the last few years. A week ago the press showed this was so yet the popular perception is if you earn a lot of money you live in Monaco, pay no tax and that tax is some kind of voluntary thing.

bye, why do you rent? It just seems odd. Also get a better litigation lawyer - I am always advising clients to settle, it's a bottomless pit.

I don't need people to weep for us higher earners. We are both very lucky and usually particularly hard working and prepared to do things those who earn less are not.

Sorry? What exactly are you "prepared to do that those who earn less are not"?

This is a very very shitty thing to say. You need to get off your fucking high horse and recognise that higher earnings don't mean you are a better harder working person. You are having some good fortune in your life. You are not a harder worker, you are not more intelligent, you are not more deserving than any other person on the face of this planet.

We pay higher rate taxes, we are high earners. I don't do a hell of a lot of things that people who earn less have to do.

I can only hope I misunderstood your post.

Prepared to go back to work 2 weeks after having twins perhaps?

Prepared to study for years?

I am sure that millions of women around the world who have little or no money go back to work straight after having babies all the time.

Spending many years studying is a privilege that is beyond the reach of many people.