AIBU to think it’s rather sensible for young women to consider earning potential/ wealth when choosing a life partner?

[OompaLumpaLabrador]

My mum always said that it doesn’t matter how wealthy or otherwise a man is, as long as you love each other. Which I guess is easy to say when, as a young nurse, you fell for a very decent and lovable surgeon ( my dad).

But I’m 43 now, and the life choices friends have made are all coming out in the wash. And the reality appears that those of us who opted to spend our lives with men and women with money have by far the better deal. There’s more freedom around healthcare, education, location, travel and work ( give up, part time, full time). The unpleasant and time consuming household chores are outsourced. There seems less stress in the partnerships because there are no money worries. The partnerships just seem easier. And if it doesn’t work out, a decent divorce settlement means women aren’t left high and dry.

Of course, love comes first. And maybe I’m getting cynical in my old age. But I’m not sure I’ll be giving my daughters quite the sake advice as my mum gave me. AIBU?

I agree with marrying your equal. IME the best thing to aim for is balanced relationships, in terms of careers as well as in other areas. Less likelihood of resentment (on either side).

@araiwa

Gold-digger is the phrase you're looking for

Yep. What is with this weak women who have to seek out a man to support her financially giving up love/friendship etc for it. Feels like someone stepped out of the last century.

How about making your own money @OompaLumpaLabrador your mother has old fashioned views.

Apologises your mum said love was important it's you @OompaLumpaLabrador who is out of touch. Don't infect your daughters with your old fashioned view. Perhaps mum was trying to warn you not to seek money because she could see personality traits that worried her.

"Marry for lurve and see how it sustains you when your child needs shoes if you've married a bum of a guy."

There are numerous threads on here where the guy, a higher earner, controls the money and the wife hasn't got access to it. Can't just go buy shoes, to use your example.

It really isn't as straight forward as no money v money. The situation when you meet isn't always the situation later on down the road. Life just isn't that black and white.

Do you think all men marry for love and not money? I knew a guy for years. Bit of a player. He met a woman who had a very well paid job, owned her own central London flat and had a wealthy family. Guess who the player decided to marry? I know of at least one affair he’s had since they married.

Yes teach your daughters to support themselves financially and not rely on a man. But then you also need to teach them that some men will then seek to feather their own nest on the back of the woman’s hard work.

No. All women should just be concerned for their own earning potential. Anything else takes us back centuries.

What a strange opinion.

It is more important for them to consider their own earning potential.

No need to worry about what you get it the divorce settlement if you can earn enough to give yourself a comfortable future without a man. No need to feel trapped by money so you can be happy that you don't have to stay in an unhappy marriage.

OP you’re getting a lot of shtick here! I have exactly the same thoughts as you.
It’s not about marrying a wealthy man but one with potential. Meaning has the drive, ambition and desire to earn more. Because childcare is expensive, I don’t want to be the sole, main earner.

The majority of people meet plenty of men they ‘could’ have a relationship with. So why settle for a man with no ambition? You can easily find one who does AND is a good guy.

It’s easy for me because most of the men I have stuff in common with are high earners anyway.

@user512

I work in a profession and earn well. DH earns very well. I earned twice his salary when we first met. He now earns much more than I do. We contribute pretty equally to parenting and household involvement. I’ve been able to establish my private practice because we could afford to take a financial risk, so in that sense his earnings have helped my career.

So if you'd taken your own advice you'd potentially miss out on your DH as you earned double he did? As you can see people's careers develop and change.

Honestly think you should worry less about your daughters' sex lives, help them be the best they can be and trust them to do the rest, they will only resent you otherwise. Imagine if they married for security and were bitterly unhappy, you'd be an easy person to blame!

OP mentioned earning potential. Not actual earnings. A junior doctor is very different from a 35 year old retail worker.

I've never worried about how much my partners have earned, as long as they worked and were solvent./responsible with money.

One thing that I didn't consider, and on reflection, I should have, was whether my dp could cope with the fact I earned more than him.

I'm surprised how many perfect normal men get seriously weird about their girlfriends earning more than they do. And then they either start with the put downs and undermining, or they stop bothering with their own career and quietly plan to live of their partner.

I married my equal and everything is in balance. We share the household chores. We pay equal amount towards the bills. We took equal time off for kids.
I've had relationships with men doing lower paid jobs - and felt held back. Often couldn't do things because they couldn't afford it. One ex sulked at me for a day because I treated myself to some expensive boots. I wasn't able to enjoy my own financial independence.
I've had relationships with men in extremely high paid jobs - and felt held back. As if my career were unimportant in comparison, and if we were ever to start a family, mine would be the first to go. And that I could just rely on that person's money instead of pushing myself to be the best version of myself.
Only once I found someone in a similar position to myself, that is when money stopped being an issue. The best way to have money in a relationship is without any "power" attached to it. The amount we have isn't tiny, isn't huge, but it's equally earned and equally distributed. That, for me, is financial freedom in a relationship - not necessarily having lots of it.

People are just wilfully misconstruing the OP so they can have a rant. Considering your own earning potential doesn't guarantee you will get a good job. If a woman wants children, should she only consider her sole ability to provide for them, and not the father's? Should only women with well-paid jobs be permitted to have children? Why wouldn't you take into account both partners' earning potential? It will affect where and how you will be able to live, even without taking possible children into account.

I don't agree. I wouldn't trade the love and connection I have with my husband of 16 years, for more money. He works for a low wage; I am able to earn a higher wage luckily. That love and connection, and understanding each other, is of utmost importance. And I can't stand flash men anyway. I know not all wealthy men are flash though!

YABU

I’m example of career woman with DH in low salary job. He’s very hardworking and great at what he does, it just doesn’t pay well. On the plus side, he’s available for childcare and cooks dinner everyday.

I know 2 people with high earning husbands (£200k+).

Friend with functioning alcoholic who drinks up to 3 bottles of wine a day. Friend puts up with it and effectively a single parent to their children as he’s unable to do anything in the evenings or weekend. He’s not a nasty drunk, but still completely useless.

Cousin is SAHM and divorcing husband who started out as lovely guy 20 years ago, but has turned into an arsehole as his career has progressed. It’s really changed him/ brought out the worst. In the last few years he’s been emotionally and financially abusing her.

I know which husband I’d prefer!

Career woman sounds a bit cringe, but you know what I mean

I think strong work ethic and moral integrity are vital. I hope my sons both demonstrate these traits and marry people with similar behaviours.

@Namenic

OP - in a sense I don’t think you are wrong. But there is so much MORE than earning potential to be considered.

A better term would be financial responsibility and outlook. Eg someone in a low paying job, hard working may be a great saver, look for good deals, handy with DIY (saving a fortune if any work needs to be done on house), great with kids. That would be just as good as earning potential. They need to have similar expectations (eg spending habits, attitudes to extended family, feelings about children). And they need to show kindness and care to my child and others (as I would expect my child to show to them).

Financial responsibility and outlook should be a necessary condition; but not sufficient on its own. High earning would not be a necessary.

There’s an interesting nuance here. ‘High’ earning isn’t necessary, but an average is. The national median is £30K. The reason is because 2 average earners take home more thanks to the personal allowance , than one high earner. Furthermore if anything happens someone with an average job (not saying it’s easy, but possible) could get back into the workforce at something other than the minimum wage. Even better if they were part time. You also need to consider things like a pension.

No matter how financially savvy someone is they can only save so much before low pay becomes an issue. And childcare is a burden only for the first few years.

The majority of people manage to achieve the median salary after a decade of continuous years in the workforce anyway. So I’d advise my daughters - just don’t marry anybody on low pay and no plans to change that. Decent men with at least an average salary aren’t rare. No need for them to sell themselves short.

I dated men with ambition. I didn't really care what they did so long as they weren't just boring nobodies doing the bare minimum. Ambition and drive always pays off.

One boyfriend refused to get a job at all, while I was climbing the ranks in banking. He didn't last long, not because he was poor, but because he was lazy.

You see posters on here like "DH doesn't work, he doesn't know what to do" or "Doesn't work because he always loses jobs" - again, sack them off not because they're poor, but because of what those things suggest about their character.

Also to add it’s not ‘only’ about earning potential. But a combination of factors.
This is a highly hypothetical situation anyway as through all my dating app years I’ve only been on dates with 3 low paid men. Most people weren’t high earners , but average.

Absolutely not. If you're with a partner for their money, you are totally dependent on them.
I can't think of a worse message to give girls!

@tigger1001

Future prospects are just that prospects.

Lots can happen to change them. Illness/accident for example.

And it goes the opposite way - someone who is thought to have no "prospects" changes focus/takes classes etc and all of a sudden has higher earning prospects.

Sharing similar values is more important than worrying about financial prospects. We are all in charge of our own financial prospects.

Can we imagine the uproar if the message was that men should choose their partner with care re financial prospects?

What uproar? I think everybody choose their partners according to financial prospects and the lifestyle that they want. That way men won’t marry low paid women and make it the default that they stay at home.

Or if they marry an average earner with proper career not expect her to give it all up.

The time to think about this is before marrying, not when the woman is pregnant.

My mum said choose the man with potential... Then you work together to build your team.

Its more important to think what sort of lifestyle you want and pick a partner who will help you achieve it, not leave it entirely down to you.

This isn't just money - but things like if you've picked a career that will reasonably mean in your late 20s you need to be based in London doing 12 hour days, then a partner who wants to start a family then and wants to live in the countryside (so sticking a couple of hours onto your day on a commute) isn't going to lead to a happy life. If you want to travel, and "work to live, not live to work", a partner who is career focused, wants to buy a house soon, wants to put spare cash into retirement funds etc is probably not for you.

YABU I think the focus had to be your own earning potential not your partners. Obviously love has to be there and you have to be on the same in attitudes to key things too.

If you marry a rich bastard, you spend the rest of your life earning it. If you marry a poor bastard, you spend the rest of your life not getting paid.

I could have stayed with a high earning man. He would have expected me to be largely a SAHM and would have seen that as a green light to spend his weekends out of the house getting paralytic with his mates.

I went with a very poor guy after who was much more respectful, but we struggled a lot in the beginning as I was starting out after a career change too. We both work FT and life is hard sometimes with two kids, but we both earn ok money (well pretty good if looking at the IFS site, but not so great by MN standards if you believe every post about income). He earns more than me now, so I think actually having someone believe in him and not throw him on the scrap heap because of his income really helped him.

I think we both probably wonder what life would have been like if we had gone with someone more established in a high earning career with wealthy parents (we both had neither), but we have both been with people with money and found them (as someone earning less than them) very controlling and jealous and took liberties because they felt they could.

There are so many women with high earning partners who just treat them like an ornament or skivvy, and some SAHP's who demand too much from the with the high earning partner too because of the balance of power in the relationship. It is rare I come across a relationship where one partner is the sole breadwinner and everything is sunshine and rainbows.