Payrise and maintenance

[Lillo7]

Keen to hear people's opinions about this.

Two DC, father is married with more children. Mother is single.

Father is not on a great wage however his wife has received several payrises in the years they've been together and works in a professional career which means as a whole their household is quite well off and can afford quite a lot of luxuries.

Maintenance is paid by the father based on his low wage. Mother is struggling a little as also on a lower wage.

Mother argues that they should pay more as a household instead due to wife's higher pay, obviously not officially through CMS as they don't take new partners into account, but morally. Wife disagrees and says what she earns is nothing to do with the mother and is for her household/children/ stepchildren when there, not at their mums.

Father stuck in the middle a bit.

Random poll options

YABU - wife should subsidise higher maintenance.

YANBU - Mother and father should care for their children on their own respective wages and what wife earns is nothing to do with the mother.

Clearly mumsnet will not approve of “levelling things up” here

He needs to step up and start maximising his income. He’s should feel very rubbish that there’s such a disparity in his children’s quality of life.

But from what I've read, he's already got a respectable job/income, its just that the OP is doing pretty well too, so between them they are comfortable. Why do both households have to be equal? Its unrealistic.

Do you think ex - who child does not live with - should receive money from the RP because they have more?

It really depends on what 'feeling the pinch' means.

The way I see it, both parents are (at least morally) 'joint and severally liable' to provide their children with a decent standard of living - for the whole time, not just 50% or less of the time. This means that if one parent is unable to or welches out, the other parent is still wholly responsible, not just 50% responsible.

For example, single parents can't say "well, I'm only 50% responsible for my child, aren't I?" and demand that social services sort something out for the other 50% of the time.

So your DH has a responsibility to make sure his DC have a decent standard of living 100% of the time, not just the 50% they are with him. Likewise, his ex has a responsibility to ensure that the DC have a decent standard of living 100% of the time. If overall the DC aren't properly provided for, both parents are at fault regardless of in whose house it occurs.

But 'properly provided for' doesn't mean 'equal standard of living'. So it does come down to the specifics of what you mean by 'feeling the pinch'. If there's not enough food or any money to replace outgrown shoes or clothes, if your SDC are living in a freezing house, if there's no money for school trips (and I don't mean the skiing holidays) and if basic extracurriculars (again, not Pony Club!) are being cut, then I do think your DH has to take more responsibility here to ensure his kids have a decent life. And driving around in a new car would just seem singularly tactless and inappropriate in those circumstances, regardless of whoever paid for it. But if it's simply that they'll have to go camping this summer rather than a holiday abroad, then that's clearly a different thing.

I mean it is jointly owned so poor word use and DSS will get a share from DHs half but I am fuming about that comment.

A good comparison would be the mums who send nappies/clothes/food with young children for contact, because they don't trust their useless exes to provide what is needed. Yes, they don't have to - but they do it because otherwise the kids will go without and their priority is to prevent this, not 'fairness'.

I’m just challenging those that say, without considering context, that it’s all about an equal standard of living and (usually the man) should pay to ensure that happens.

Go for the position above, move to a similar but higher paying role at a different company? Upskill.
the normal things that people do to increase their pay.

no time for that, but always time to make more children when the others are barely managing.

Go for the position above, move to a similar but higher paying role at a different company? Upskill.
the normal thing ma that people do to increase their pay.
no time for that, but always time to make more children when the others are barely managing.

But who's to say he hasn't already done that? The whole point of this thread is that the OP earns good money, there's nothing to say that her husband doesn't, or doesn't want to!!!

That’s not a good comparison.

A comparison would be a SM having to buy the child nappies in both houses because neither parent cares that their child is going without.

But there’s no reason to assume the parents don’t care. It sounds like the ex here is just thinking about how much she can get and not thinking ‘oh it’s great the kids get so much because @Lillo7 earns a decent salary’.

OP has said he isn’t on a great wage.

So it’s that easy
anyone can just “earn more” should they wish to

or is it just the men NRPs you think can magically pull more money out of their arse?

I think it’s really daft/ unrealistic that just because a dad’s partner has a high earning job, the he should just magically get a job with the same amount of earnings just so that the mum’s household has as much as the stepmum brings in.

Do people not realise that sometimes, women are more skilled than men? Have higher qualifications? And therefore they will have more money?

Sometimes the stepmum is better off than both the mum and the dad and that’s absolutely 100% ok!

If the dad is to go and get a higher earning job, then he might have go and do the MN unthinkable and possibly train. We all know how frowned upon it is for a dad to cut down his hours so he can study/ have a career change. So what exactly do you want him to do if you want him to ensure that eventually his children have the same standard of living at their mum’s as they do at their dad’s? And even then, even if he did earn as much as his partner, the ex would only be getting a percentage of that amount whereas the dad’s partner gets to keep ALL of hers for the dad’s household. So it’s never ever going to be equal.

If the mum’s partner was well off, absolutely nobody would be falling over themselves to say the children need the same standard of living at their dad’s house. So this whole thing just screams of nothing more than jealously and the fact that so many people think that only one household matters: the mum’s.

So it’s that easy
anyone can just “earn more” should they wish to

or is it just the men NRPs you think can magically pull more money out of their arse?

Just the men, by the sound of it .....

I didn’t say it was easy, you asked how and I gave an example.

Go for the position above, move to a similar but higher paying role at a different company? Upskill.
the normal things that people do to increase their pay.

What a ridiculous idealistic view. We'd all be doing that if we could but it's not quite as simple as you'd like to make out.

As a PP poster has mentioned, it's always so one-sided. The children MUST have the same quality of life as the other children at their dad's house, but should mum meet and marry a billionaire, nobody would be insisting that they should be raising the dad's standard of living.

No one is saying he has to earn equally, but if his other children are disadvantaged and struggling and he can’t afford to pay anymore most people look at ways to increase their income. both men and women

lots of parents do and have to when things are tight for their children.

As a PP poster has mentioned, it's always so one-sided. The children MUST have the same quality of life as the other children at their dad's house, but should mum meet and marry a billionaire, nobody would be insisting that they should be raising the dad's standard of living.

Yep, we love a double standard round here!

my ex is...lol he can jog on.
my child is well provided for, not at his house, but thats his choice. one day the children involved will understand, kids aren't daft.

If the mum’s partner was well off, absolutely nobody would be falling over themselves to say the children need the same standard of living at their dad’s house. So this whole thing just screams of nothing more than jealously and the fact that so many people think that only one household matters: the mum’s.

Quoting my own post here but I just wanted to add something else to it.

If the mum had a well off partner, not only would there be nobody saying the children need the same lifestyle at both houses “for consistency”. But if the mum’s household is better off, then there is definitely more of a 💁🏼‍♀️💁🏼‍♀️💁🏼‍♀️🖕🏻🖕🏻🖕🏻 you go girl approach when the mum is the one doing well. So why can’t the stepmum just enjoy her money without GAF about anyone else?

I don’t think anyone is advocating for Step mum to give the kids her money. But I don’t think a father should be unconcerned if the mother of other children has expressed that she is struggling.

It’s definitely not SM responsibility but it is his. Though you’re all right he didn’t have to legally do thing.

probably as they get older they’ll want to stay at dads more as there’s more resources so mum will have time to get a second job anyway /s

I know DH says exh is round the twist. The sad thing is when exh and I were together he seemed very normal and reasonable. He cheated on me and I found out and divorced him. I don't think he thought I ever would because I really loved him. The divorce was horrendous. He made everything so much harder by refusing to just go 50/50 on everything. He was abusive to me and tried to threaten DH when I was dating him. He came to my house the first Valentine's day after we had divorced and made my son let him in. I wasn't there. He smashed a glass vase with some lilies I'd been given. I came home to glass everywhere. He threatened to turn up at our wedding and spoil it. Then after all that shit he put DH and me through for several years he thinks we should let him use our holiday home. He's jealous because the DC and DGC come on holiday with me and DH sometimes and not him. If he'd been nicer to them who knows. I think he's on his own and instead of getting on with his life he sits and stews on stuff. Our kids think he has MH issues. He's definitely obsessive about the bloody pension.

Absolutely no-one will take OP’s income into consideration.

OP’s DH doesn’t have to earn more just because his ex wants
more. Also, there may well be disparity between households, this does not automatically need resolved by the more well-off parent, that’s just life.

Well there’s 2 things there - it’s important to check there was a financial order in the divorce. If there isn’t one, when one is applied for, the courts will care about the OP’s income. I’m not saying it’s fair but it is worth op checking.

The second thing, is that everyone is assuming the Mother wants more - but what if the children actually need more? They are his children too and the CMS calculator’s aren’t foolproof.

They weren’t married.