If your SO pays their share of bills and does half of childcare and chores, do you care if they work?

[nonchalant]

As long as your SO/DH contributed half of the bills and mortgage, did at least half of taking care of the children, and at least half of household chores, would you care whether they worked or not or if they worked just one day a week for example? This is on the assumption that you keep finances separate so their level of income does not impact you.

i think the issue would be do both people have the same amount of leisure time?

Yes , unless health issues they should want their children to have the benefit of a full time wage. I would include the partner in that though, separate finances do not a partnership make.

I'd expect them to work properly not a few days a week. Unless they are rich and don't have to.

If they were staying at home full time I’d expect them to do the bulk of the chores and life admin.

I agree if you aren't working you can't expect the oh to do 50% of the work

If they were able to pay half of the bills without working, but I had to work full time to financially contribute the same, I’d expect them to be doing the majority of the house chores, childcare and life admin.

I suppose I would be a bit unimpressed by some one who didnt work at all, unless there were young children at home.

Part of what attracted me to DH was his intelligence, drive/ambition and work ethic so I don't think I would have gone for someone happy to not work (eg someone sitting on a big trust fund or something).

Is he rich from previous work? i.e. famous pop star / actor / tech entrepreneur? My friend semi-retired at 40 from his tech company. He still works there part time but wants to spend more time with his DC. He is a multi-millionaire abs still owns his company

Maybe different situation I am the only earner in our house due to my husband being made redundant after a stint on furlough. He is retraining to get his hgv licence and is looking for jobs in the meantime. He has all the housework done for me coming in and cooks aswell. I'm happy to support him while he betters himself as it will in turn give us a better future and more job prospects. He would do the same for me

Depends on what I had to do to match it I guess. If I had to work full time and still do 50% of all chores etc whilst he spent the days on the golf course or something then yeah I would get pissed off I think.

No. I wouldn't care. I might be a bit envious if they got to lounge in bed as I rushed to work though! If they had so much money that they didn't need to work, and we shared a home, it'd be nice if I could reduce my hours

@Sensateria

If they were able to pay half of the bills without working, but I had to work full time to financially contribute the same, I’d expect them to be doing the majority of the house chores, childcare and life admin.

Yeah, that'd make sense. And tbh a lot of women on maternity leave end up doing everything... just as their lives got insanely busy with a baby glued to them all day long.

I wouldn’t be impressed if my partner thought that was a fair and equal relationship. I was out of work for a few months and did all of the housework during that time. I didn’t have anything else to do, it would have been ridiculous to expect that chores still be split equally.

Agree with PPs, if I worked FT and DH worked just 1 days a week I'd expect him to cover all the childcare and housework unless there were health reasons that he couldn't. Assuming he was very wealthy and could e.g. pay for nannies and a housekeeper and gardener etc then I'm not sure how I'd feel about a relationship where I was working FT and he was doing next to nothing. I mean, sure if he was that wealthy then I probably could work PT as well but that would have an impact on my career and would I want that and what if I'm widowed? It creates such an imbalance doesn't it. And 'covering the bills' is not exactly raking it in, what about children's activities and holidays and Christmas and pensions and cars and stuff. DH and I have a very good income and lifestyle so if one of us reduced our income so it just covered the bills that would be a massive drop in all the things that make life fun. What is the reason for the question? Is the drop in working hours because of wealth or health or laziness? The discussion around the consequences would be impacted by the reasons.

How are they paying their half if they don’t work?

If independently wealthy no issue, if they are claiming benefits, yeah unless good reason I’d want them to work.

I dated someone who had stopped work after selling a huge number of share options and no longer needed to work.

While it sounds ok, it didn't work. I would come home having done a full day's work plus school run, tired, he'd spent the day chilling out or playing golf, and he wanted to party, whereas I wanted to collapse in front of the TV.

I’m assuming this is a benefits case or very low income? Otherwise why would keeping finances seperate be important. It reads like it’s low. But unless an age gap then I’d assume not retirement as child care mentioned.

So unless there was some health issue then damn right I’d want them to work.

Going against the grain and assuming that the person was wealthy which is why they didn’t have to work, it wouldn’t bother me. As long as there was still enough money to be able to go on holidays, days out etc then I feel that it’s not up to me to tell someone else how to spend their time regardless if in a relationship or not.

I also wouldn’t expect more than 50% of housework done. Everyone needs meals cooked, washing done, a clean house, just because someone has to go out to work to pay the bills and someone doesn’t, it doesn’t mean that the person who works effectively has a free ride on not having to do much housework. What is the other person getting out of the relationship when they contribute the same amount financially but then have to do all the housework for someone. Obviously this would be different if there was only one earner but 50/50 split then no.

It wouldn’t be for me, I like a work ethic in a partner so regardless of the rest I wouldn’t be happy or in that situation.

Rather than a straight down the middle 50/50 financial split, it could be more equal for each person to work part time and contribute the same percentage of their income to the household.

I think I’d find it very difficult to have a partnership as close as I want a marriage/cohabiting one to be if there was a vast disparity in the effort and sacrifice we both put in to making it work. So I suspect I would mind.

Covering half - do you mean covering it just woth no money for luxuries or financial planning to reach mutual goals, like a bigger house ir holidays?

Or do you mean has more than they need.

I’d be happy with a contribution of half the bills and half the childcare/house work etc.

This situation must arise when one partner retires before the other.

@SwimBaby

This situation must arise when one partner retires before the other.

That's what I was thinking of, either retirement or got some kind of huge payout (redundancy/medical?) so can afford not to work.