How much should your partner earn....

[nonwonderwoman]

I have always been ambitious but my DH has outstripped my earnings by at least double check in the last 5 years.
This hasn't generally bothered me as I have earned well in the legal profession and developed an excellent reputation at work. However my DH has recently been awarded a salary of £215k + .
The feminist in me wants to keep going to work and building my reputation and professional life but the realist in me wonders whether to give up my job and start enjoying a simple life. ABUR?

Why managedmis? I went back after 2.5 years

Btw OP I had planned on being off longer but was going potty at home.

I wouldn't. However that is due to seeing both sides. I have been a SAHM and is was boring and our relationship suffered. I work now and love it, yes of course there is the usual juggle (3 primary age children) but as I have got older I didn't like knowing my future was all down to my husband. If he were to walk out on me tomorrow I would be 100% ok. It's your choice of course but I would maybe see about part time hours first before making any decisions.

Also for the other flip of the coin I know a couple of mums who are SAHM and they love it and have actually refused to go back to work however they are very social so probably dont get very bored and they dont seem concerned about pensions/future like I am.

@SuperMumTum I hope all of you top 1%ers are giving something back?

Is £400k+ in tax and NI enough for you?

So you want to live off your husband? A man would be called a Cocklodger for that

And that’s even as a SAHD , I might add

@Samcarpy92 not intended as either a brag or humble. It was facts replying to a PP who thought I was getting a rough deal. Yes we have a huge income, yes we have huge outgoings. But if something happened to DHs job we could seriously cut back and I could go full time and we’d be fine. If I didn’t have a job the changes would be huge.

What I always wonder if how someone goes from earning 60k to 215k?
It's not necessarily hard to get to 80-150k if you work in professional services following a structured path but the 200k jobs are rarer.

OP, I wonder if you are getting fixated on the money, and if you've lost perspective a bit...?

You love your job, you are respected, and ( your DH aside) you earn an excellent salary.
Your posts read as though you know your DH will always out earn you, you'll never ' catch up', and so you feel it's all hopeless.

Life is tough when kids are small- there is a ton of juggling.

Perhaps you need to stop thinking competitively about your wage, and focus on the fact that you love your job.

Do you feel your worth is tied to your wage?
Does your DH feel that your job/ you are " less than" just because you earn less?

Don’t quit work, but if your job feels like it’s losing meaning, use the opportunity to move to one thing you love. My DH is a high earner, (although not as high as some here) and a few years ago, I took the opportunity to quit my job and retrain as a teacher and I bloody love my job.

I still earn a respectable salary and he has been sensible with his earnings, paying off our mortgage and saving for the future. We’re now in a position that we are enjoying the lifestyle that his salary affords, but we are content that if something happened to one of us, we could survive comfortably on greatly reduced wages (we don’t plan on having children). He works in the tech industry and his job could go at any time.

My dad was a high earner who expected to earn at the same level for another ten years when he became seriously ill in his 50s. It caused all sorts of financial insecurity for my parents. It can all tumble down if something happens to the high earner.

I think it must cause a great deal of stress for a person solely responsible for all of the bread winning in a family,

Tbh law is quite a demanding profession. I wouldn't give up work even if I won the lotto but I only work p/t & tto

@justplopit When you make partner in a firm (Big 4 or other type of firm), you generally buy a share in it and therefore rather than getting a salary, you get a share of the profits. But it also comes with a big risks as you become liable for the entire partnership if it gets sued/goes bust etc. It's not like a promotion, it's a complete change in the way that you're compensated.

Could you drop hours,? I did this for 4 years to be more present in DC's lives and it saved my sanity.

I can’t imagine having the attitude of “oh he earns enough now for me to be a kept woman” 🤢 while still pretending to be a feminist. Like @Jarvisisgod said, a man would be called a cocklodger, and I can think of plenty of even less flattering terms for women.

It just seems so mercenary somehow. Making a mutual decision for one parent to stay at home with children, whatever the household income is very different from saying “yay, you finally earn enough to keep me in the manner to which I’m accustomed”.

Then there’s the spate of threads lately with the high earning lazy-arse man, poor downtrodden SAHM woman. It seems like a man earning that much would then expect his (housekeeper/nanny/cook/cleaner) wife to earn her keep and do literally everything, while he worked ever-so-hard to enable you to not contribute anything.

Your DH won’t be able to rely on his job being secure for the rest of his career... If you give up your job you need to think how you would manage if he lost it.

Also, if he’s not long got this job, he may find he hates it or that its expectations are unsustainable long term.

My DH and I used to earn the same amount pre kids (we met through work), but after a few years as a SAHM, going back to work in a different role, plus a few promotions for him, he now earns a LOT more than me. I definitely wouldn't be a SAHM now my DC are schools age, even though we could afford it, as I get a lot of personal satisfaction from my job (as well as the financial independence mentioned by other posters).

Could you go part time? That might be a good compromise?

My partner earns about 8x less than yours. And if I were full time you would earn 2x what I do.
Boggles the mind. Why would anyone need that much money? How can you be worth so much more than us? I was a straight A student, speak 3 languages, and was encouraged to teach. I work hard.
But all that aside, my motivation is not to outearn my husband (I do). It is to have happy kids. I am currently applying to drop my hours. I work 4 days now, and I want to see more of my kids, so am applying to drop to 2 days.

I'm in the position of choosing to work. I feel very guilty for doing so but my mental health doesn't stand up well being a sahm. I enjoy financial independence and my husband likes my work ethic, likes that I see a career as important. I suspect our relationship would change massively, for the worse if I stopped working.

I would become a SAHM. And it's what I did; I was lucky enough to be able to stay at home until my younger child was 15. It is not humdrum; that's such a cliche. It's what you make of it. In my case, it gave me the time and the freedom to do things I really love doing, as well as be there for my children. My time was my own, and I could be creative and let loose on developing talents I always knew I had. Guess what, it worked! I ended up earning more than my husband and now, as a retired widow, have a really good income and lots of time. Getting bored or lonely is up to the individual. I always say, only boring people get bored.
At the very least, I have tons of novels to read, and since reading is my favourite hobby...!
In this society we are conditioned to think we have to be high achievers in order to be worthwhile. It's just not true.
I have a friend who is a lawyer who quit her high-achieving job years ago and built something else with her qualifications.
I personally never enjoyed "having a job". THAT was pretty humdrum if you ask me.

ok thanks @mynameiscalypso & how hard is it too become a partner? I know some lawyers/barristers who earn 150k plus but jeez they work for their money (not saying some professions earning less don't).

If he’s just made partner I wouldn’t give up work, it’s not a done deal, he can still get canned. Consulting is more volatile than the audit side and can be quite boom and bust (I’m Big 4 too).

We go to work for more than just money - feeling useful, self respect, social connections, making a contribution to society (depending on your role). You and your wants mean some even if your DH earns a lot - marriage is not a competition.

DH earns 250k+. I earn a tiny fraction of this in a public sector job, because I like it and I would get bored staying at home. I have just dropped to four days. I take a day off for sports day. Do what makes you happiest.

@justplopit Teally really hard! My DH isn't there yet but works on average 70 - 80 hours a week. I woke up at 1am the other day and heard him on a conference call with a client in the US. He's already in the office now.

My husband (lawyer) earned 20 times what I did when I met him. I still worked. After my first child I made about £20/day after childcare but it was still important to me (though it was part time). I stopped when pregnant with second due to health reasons, and as I would then be paying about £50 a day to work due to childcare costs, I never went back. I work now they are teenagers (self employed, still earning about 5% of what my husband would be if he was still alive).
Some jobs are much better paid than others, that doesn't mean they are more worthwhile. Plus I would never have wanted (or been able to) do the hours and deal with the stress he had (a major reason why he passed away).

You don't want to be a SAHM and there is more to work than just the money. If you have a nanny then surely you just get home and the children are there, fed and watered?

@mynameiscalypso Jesus that's a lot of hours 😱. Does he help with the house work though ;)