DH and career, salary

[hjliu8999]

To preface this with, this issue is not new and has been a source of tension between DH and I ever since we got together decades ago. But just had yet another fight with DH regarding his job and whether he should look for something else.

He's been in his current position for three years now, no salary increase and no promotion - and realistically it just wont happen, they said so. I've been trying to encourage him to move on. He admits he doesnt like his job or sector so it's not like he loves it or anything but just doesn't know how to look for anything else.

And frankly am fed up. We used to live abroad where he was in the same position for ten years - no promotion and just inflationary salary increases. We came back due to my job so he found the first thing he could and basically it's the same thing. But by now we have DC and London is really expensive (his current job is also half the money he earned abroad). By now he's 42 so time is not exactly on his side. And I appreciate that 55k is not nothing, but he has three degrees and is working in a professional job.

From my side I do work full time - in the sector that he used to work in and by now earn more than he does. But it's a public sector ish job and I wont be able to find anything in the private sector (those jobs just dont exist). Realistically my pay progression is rubbish (max I will ever earn is probably 70kish) but I do have a lot more flexibility and annual leave so do more of the childcare.

Am just really fed up. With the cost of living going up along with interest rates - we have a big mortgage - and I dont know how to convince DH that he needs to find something else. He accuses me of wanting him to earn more money - like thats a bad thing or something. Am I being unreasonable or is he? Any tips on how to change things.

To add he should obviously be living within his means though, if he doesn’t want to change jobs he needs to stop whining about it and also stop spending more than he can afford to. Especially when you’re earning similar and yet he’s conveniently checked out of all the childcare stuff

@Shedcity you need to go back and read all OP’s posts.

She’s already explained why they came back to the U.K. She has explained why she’s reluctant to use childcare. She’s already made it clear that she doesn’t want the career progression just to make money - but for the progression itself.

Sounds like he has his head in the sand , he wants you to pick up the adult stuff while doing a job he hates , which covers him from getting on with anything.
Certainly something needs changing otherwise in 10 years time you will be in the same boat. You have been together a long time, what are his positives?

It would be useful to know which sector he is in - I find it very weird that he can't do any remote / flexi working whatsoever, particularly if it's loosely related to his 3 degrees.

Sounds like he just doesn't want to compromise at all, an ostrich with his head in the sand.

You need to settle on a budget - going from £190k /yr to circa £110k /yr in an expensive city without any lifestyle changes is foolish.

Every decision can come from that e.g.:
move to to a cheaper location
gym membership
Food budget
Increase your earnings - you &/or DH
childcare

Do you think he is depressed? It is hard to get motivated into action when you are in a dark place

I originally thought YABU but having read your later posts, your DH IBU to not cut back on his spending. When you have DC and when you earn less money/have higher living costs, you have to make cut backs and live within your means or get into debt.

I refuse to get into debt or spend all my savings, so I live how I can afford to live.

If your DH wants flashy holidays and cars, food, clothes etc, then he does need to up his game if your day to day living costs are high and use all your salaries.

He needs to understand that his life and lifestyle have changed and either do something about it or stop moaning and stop spending.

Is this for real?

He sounds lazy, undynamic, irresponsible, immature, egotistic - and self-indulgently miserable. He can take his anti-capitalist gripes and try to pay for his gym membership and expensive diet with them. For a man with 3 degrees, he’s not very clever, is he?

You earn just as much as him, do more childcare than him at the expense of your own career progression (which would actually help him), worry about long term finances while he spends on expensive food and gym membership, and YOU listen to HIM moaning?

Lady, you’ve got this all wrong. This isn’t a partnership. This is you looking after him financially, emotionally, practically, and him treating you like you’re his parent and you owe him. You don’t need marriage counselling. He needs a sharp dose of reality.

Cut it out, all of it. When he moans, tell him you’ve had enough and don’t want to hear it again. Organise your accounts so that salaries are apportioned to a budget which you have set, taken him through, and told him is the way things need to be because you have children to raise. It’s pathetic and unfair that you’d have to do things this way, but he’s behaving like a limp biscuit and pathetically immaturely. He has no answers, just moans that he dumps on you.

I'm thinking YANBU because
He contributes less than half financially, BUT:
He also contributes less than half of childcare etc
Whilst not liking his job.
He is not pulling his share on anything AND is unhappy doing it. It doesn't make sense to keep going like that.

I have mentioned childcare to him, but this is when he comes back with modern society not being designed for two working parents etc which I do agree with but he also brings up his lack of flexibility and if I want him to do pick ups he needs to quit his job and stay at home. However, I don't see how we can live on just my salary in London. So he sort of blames me for having to work instead of being a stay at home dad.

@hjliu8999

So you need to go to some form of counselling. Where he is forced to listen to you.

He's being intransigent whilst not facing into reality.

You are meant to be a team, helping each other. It sounds like you are doing all the heavy lifting, making adult decisions and he just moans.

Which sector is he in? How old are your DC?

Is this about money? or is it about how ambitious he is or isn’t?
sounds like you may have an problem with his lack of ambition?
or does he feel the same as you?

sounds like you’re not giving us the whole picture to give the right advice…

Degrees so not = a certain pay grade unfortunately

Oh he's a real peach - your last update makes me want to pin him against a wall and punch him repeatedly ( and I'm not a violent person).

Most jobs have flexibility if you ask for it nicely - I bet his would- but it suits him much better not to request it, or he'd probably do it in a belligerent, truculent way that would make the person being requested annoyed.

What are his good points OP? Why would you want to stay married to him ?

Is this just about feelinf financially squeezed (rightly or wrongly)? Or is it more about feeling frustrated that you can't pursue further progression in your role as he doesn't help put with more childcare?

Also, how much does he moan about his job? My DH has been in the same job forever. It is a constant source of mosninf from him, on an almost daily basis. I sm totally sick of hearing about it. I want him to get another job because I am so over the constant complaining, feeling obliged to spend my evenings listening to the same stuff on repeat.... How much is that a factor? Because it bores the shit out of me to hear the complaints and then see him do nothing to change things.

moaning!

YANBU

but this is MN where posters have considered anyone on 30k plus rich, so you won’t get objective responses here (despite many claiming many on MN are middle class…)

55k isn’t a great salary for the SE, especially with his qualifications. Could he get another job on more though ? Do higher paid roles in his sector or someone with his experience could get? As if not you might need to turn your attention to your own career.

good luck

OK I'm doing a 180 now.

So he sort of blames me for having to work instead of being a stay at home dad.

THIS is why he indulges himself in the constant, daily whinging.
He is hoping to wear you down so you give in & 'support' him some more.
He hasn't got a fucking clue. How does he expect you to be able to survive on a sole income? Does he think your savings account is bottomless?

I think you need to have the talk PP have recommended, & if he doesn't step up - fuck him off.
He's an emotional & financial drain, & he doesn't even contribute 50% of effort & time into his own kids.

Out of interest, what (roughly) were your respective salaries out of the joint £190K when living abroad? Just interested in whether you've always out-earned him, or whether (as as you say he's now the lower earner on £55K) whether he's had to take a bigger pay cut than you have to move back and might be struggling with his confidence more than he wants to admit.

YANBU, obviously, that this can't continue indefinitely with him wanting to spend like you did on your previous income without eventually needing to earn more. The question is - assuming you both want your marriage to survive - how you attempt to find common ground and a common vision of what you want life to be like and how to mutually negotiate any compromises that might involved (staying in London or aiming to move abroad again/elsewhere in the UK, going full steam ahead career-wise or treading water a bit while DC are young, cutting spending or raising income, etc etc).

The fucking cheek.

@TooManyPlatesInMotion this sounds suffocating.
Why are you tolerating it?
Tonight, when he starts harping on about the same problem & expecting you to give him attention, why don't you tell him to STFU because you are done being his emotional punchbag for the problems he refuses to tackle?

@KettrickenSmiled correct. Have told him I will happily hear about and support job searches etc but I don't want to hear anything else about his current job. And then I watch TV by myself!

Good! & good luck @TooManyPlatesInMotion x

I would bet a decent amount of money that there are women who do his current job and also juggle
child care.

it also sounds like his anti capitalist “morals” are vastly at odds with his tastes and expectations.

he’s a dickhead OP. And he’s only going to get worse. I really am so sorry. But I suspect you know this. You’re only going to start to despise him more and more.

put yourself and your children first. Your marriage has started a slow death. So think about where you want to be in five years and plan accordingly.

the man child can crack on and see what his lifestyle is like when he has to do it on how own.

yoibe been together for a long time during formative years. I think you will find it a massive relief to get rid of his dead weight to be honesf

Thank you @KettrickenSmiled

Is an aupair an option so you can be more flexible?

So we've actually always earned more or less the same as each other. First as students and then in our 30s - and even now am only a bit above him. One part of the issue is that I 'made' it as an academic while he didn't - and no other jobs are apparently good enough. However, main part of the reason why I took my current job is because it was permanent and had some sort of flexibility with the kids. By contrast - his job is actually in a much more lucrative sector which whilst not very flexible should have a much greater earning potential. So the theory was - I got the permanent and more flexi job, he got a slightly less exciting but in theory a job with better prospects and this would do us. In practice, I now feel stuck listening to him moaning about his job night after night all the while having to shoulder the kids and the job, trying to figure out how to get promoted and worrying about our expenses. His idea in all of this is that it was my idea to come back and really we should just leave London, move somewhere cheaper anywhere in the world and live on our savings...I think indefinitely because jobs are rubbish.