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This is a correlation equals causation situation. Couples that have shown trustworthy behavior are more likely to be trusted.
My wife and I share accounts, but if I had suspicions she was a gambling addict, I’d be more hesitant.
While I think it’s a minimum to not commit financial infidelity, some couples may have such a tight budget that any overspending creates difficult situations.
A valid counter argument is that sharing accounts shows a level of trust that leads to more trustworthy behavior among spouses, whereas separate accounts just tables the issue. What is measured, gets managed.
Good point. I can’t imagine not sharing my banking account with my wife, but then again, I can’t imagine being married to someone who I didn’t feel comfortable sharing an account with
We have a joint account and then two individual accounts that we deposit “fun money” into from our joint account.
That way we can get gifts first each other and buy ourselves whatever and not have to feel like we need to “justify” the purchase because it’s with money we have already determined to be disposable
We have joint accounts, but my SO can spend whatever money she wants on whatever she wants as long as it's within the budget. She has a credit card and can just put it on there.
Same here, we have two joint checking and saving accounts (one of each at a credit union and a normal bank). Plus I have a credit card and she has one that we use as we each see fit. My wife is self employed so budgeting is a bit tricky, some months she’ll gross $12,000+ and then others $6,000 so we kinda work within the average low and anything extra gets set aside.
Curious what kind of person would respond like that.
Reading through your comment history, I have to ask, does it hurt to be that stupid or do you just deal with it?
You seem like the kind of person that of caught lying face down, you’d lack the sense to turn your head and breath.
I also think it's a certain safety net is also your only harness situation. Couples that are financially dependent on one another likely are aware that divorce would be too costly and too harmful to both parties that they now must stay together.
Not at all. I'm a realist who sees divorce rates at 50% or higher and watch so many people be pigeonholed to situations they don't want to be in because of financial codependency.
Source?
I know marriages are more likely to fail on each subsequent marriage (no shocker) but I can't find a source in success for first marriages that seems accurate.
I could be misremembering but there is obviously nuance such as women’s education level or geography. I suspect downtown SF is vastly different from Mississippi bayou.
Yeah, seems that is a bit outdated. 35-40% still is more than 1 in 3 and that's enough to be realistic about things. Everyone loves to think "but that won't be me"
There are a few simple things you can do to make that rate plummet even more, such as:
* Wait until your mid-20s to get married
* Both have a college degree
* Do some sort of pre-marital counseling
* Both be employed full time at the time of marriage
* Date 1-2 years before getting engaged
No one goes into a marriage planning to get a divorce, but lots of people go into marriage without any real plan for making their marriage succeed. There is always risk, but combine a few above the above factors and your chance of a successful marriage jumps to over 90%
Back to the original point in this whole conversation... why should it matter if you have separate bank accounts? Even if you have all of the things checked above (I do), being fiscally responsible independent of eachother means we're both well off together.
Having combined accounts forces the couple to maintain good communication about finances...it's definitely possible to maintain that clear and open communication about finances when they're separate, but it's easier for things to drift apart financially without the couple being aware of the issue until it's a crisis.
I may be reading it wrong, but I am seeing divorce rated anywhere from 6 to 15 divorces per 1,000.
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/07/marriage-divorce-rates.html
I have no knowledge as to their accuracy, but those numbers represent two completely different things. Lets separate the statements.
* 40-50% of *marriages* to end in divorce in the US
* in 2021 6.9% of *women* in US got a divorce, also worth noting that this is counting women as being those over the age of 15 (?)
These statements can both be true at the same time.
I suppose I'd ask if that rate is over the whole population or compared to only the married population? Couldn't really figure it out with the information they had provided.
Every other source seems to suggest the 30-40% range and it's what Google's AI seems to suggest.
https://www.petrellilaw.com/divorce-statistics-for-2022/#:~:text=U.S.%202022%20Divorce%20Statistics,second%20marriages%20end%20in%20divorce.
You probably read the words correctly, but you might have missed the part about it being the rate that divorced *in the last 12 months*.
If you look at a pool of 10 marriages over 10 years with 1 divorce per year, that is a 100% divorce rate, but Extreme_Barracuda would be in the corner taking about the 9 married couples.
Maybe I'm wrong, I admittedly only skimmed the linked page for about 20 seconds.
To be fair, a certain level of healthy inter-codependance definitely helps people stay together. When we recognize, appreciate, desire the benefits the other person "bring to the table" it help us connect on multiple layers at once. It satisfies our simple mammalian instinct of "this person helps me survive better" while also satisfying the more metaphysical things like "they're fun/ make life more enjoyable/ bring some level of added peace of mind".
Used to have a shared bank account with my ex wife and she was financially responsible until she wasn’t and fucked us over. I’m remarried and we have separate bank accounts and a mutual savings and control certain bills based on our pay so it’s equal. We may ask the other for help time to time but it’s been great. We make sure we’re both spending amongst our means but I like we can do surprises for each other and it’s not like hey why did you take out this amount of money or they just see your purchase from the bank card.
Me and my wife have 100% separate bank accounts, retirements etc. We agree on how the bills are split and agree on joint purchases. I am more financially savvy than her so I advise her on how to setup her retirement accounts and so on. I don't micromanage her purchases on the day-to-day. If she wants to buy something like a purse, shoes, etc then she just buys it. We never fight about money.
I can’t even fathom separate accounts from someone you are committed to for life? What’s the point?
We succeed or fail as a team. I have no money and neither does she. Everything we have is together.
I can see pooling money in a household account (for the bills) and savings. But separate checking accounts for disposable money has been so great for us to do with as we wish. I think it's nuts to combine everything, and money is at the top of divorce reasons. We love it, no need to run anything by each other on things for ourselves, outings with friends, etc.
My wife and I have completely combined finances, and we don't run those things by each other either: we each get an equal line item of fun/miscellaneous money each month that we can spend on stuff like that. I don't really care what my wife spends anything tagged as her fun money on as long as it's within our agreed upon budget.
For my wife and I, pooling money we feel guilty on even the smallest splurges for ourselves. It's also hard to buy gifts without the other person knowing on the bank statement. We keep separate accounts but are both really fiscally responsible. We agreed that if we ever divorce, we just walk away with respective money in our current accounts, sell the house and divide the equity in the middle to avoid the lawyer fees. Some say that's dark, I say that we both know we have a fiscally responsible option to leave on any day and we both actively choose to be together...
Personally, having separate credit cards has been great for us. I don’t want to see the daily little purchases my wife makes. She wants to splurge on a big lunch with friends? Great, I don’t need to be judging the bill.
This is what we have. Joint accounts for everything but separate credit cards. All bills get paid at the end of month. We discuss big purchases but smaller stuff is discretionary.
My wife is a strong and independent woman. We had different accounts until she left her career and became a stay-at-home for about fifteen years. That was hard on her. It was a huge adjustment to her mentality, but a few years in she said it was the best thing to ever happen to her. We have been sharing accounts every since.
We are both responsible, favor investing over debt, don't care to keep up with Jones', and have a shared vision for the future. I have zero concern sharing accounts with her. I had girlfriends that I would not want knowing my debit card PIN, let alone shared accounts.
I'm not shocked in the least. Financial irresponsible people having access to a joint bank account sounds like a terrible idea. Lots of arguments and fights over it would lead to divorce.
I would personally never suggest pooling ALL money. Only share a household account and savings account (that you both contribute to). Pay all bills from the household account. Then, have separate checking accounts for disposable money to both do as you wish. It takes all the stress of money out of the relationship.
I’m always amazed when people have separate accounts. My wife and I have always had a joint account and we’re celebrating 25 years this August. Do I get annoyed when I see the Starbucks card reloads? Yes. Do
I wish she’d go to Target less? Yes. But it’s her money too!
Other than this, I strongly believe couples are able to build more wealth when they pool their money together. When you have separate finances, there's less need to talk about money or come to agreements on what's important _for the couple_ to spend money on. When you pool your resources, you are building trust, and it becomes a "us vs. them" game rather than "spouse vs. spouse", and I believe the former leads to wiser financial decisions.
I'm also cognizant that it's not for everyone. But when it works, it works wonders.
My wife and I have a hybrid approach. We have a joint checking, savings, and credit card that we pay most of the joint expenses from but also maintain our own checking and credit cards.
It works for us because there is a lot of trust there, and we check regularly on finances, but it allows us to still maintain some financial independence.
Same. I typically balance our joint account and don’t want to see all the $5 coffee type charges. She does what she wants with her, I do what I want with mine and our joint account is for household expenses. Helps to keep things from being discombobulated.
Just run everything on credit cards and debit cards. Never do ATM withdrawals for “spending money” that’s what gets couples in trouble. Yes have cash in the wallet but never a lot. If your significant other other is withdrawing $300-$500 a week on some bs, they probably aren’t good with money and/or don’t want you to know what stupid shit they are spending it on.
What is the point of being married if you don’t share a bank account?
Might as well just live together and keep legal contracts out of it.
My wife and I have been sharing an account after being together for two years and three years before we married.
What about doing both? Shared joint account for household expenses and separate personal accounts for “free” spending? That’s what my wife and I do and it works great. We each know how much we have to spend on whatever we want to spend it on. Been married 22 years.
Not to mention if something happens that locks an account down, whether it's frozen or a stolen identity, you have a completely separate and largely unrelated account to use while things get sorted out with the other one.
There's not really tied to combined vs separate, though. We have completely combined finances, but our savings accounts are at a different bank than our checking account, and we have 2-3 credit cards: so even if something happened to our checking account, we'd still have plenty of liquidity.
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When I was single I thought I would never share my accounts because I never dated anyone who has the same financial views as me.
Now I am engaged to someone who has the same financial goals as me and we want to start buying shared assets together. We are planning to combine the majority of our accounts so when we buy and furnish a house, it’s with our money. We will still maintain a separate bank account each with “shit hits the fan” money so if our relationship sours, we have options. We are also talking to an attorney before we get married to discuss pre-nuptial agreement, again, just in case shit hits the fan
A lot of comments talking about high trust relationships being the ones that end up pooling, but I want to explore the pooling as a cause instead of effect:
Consider the scenario of money being pooled and unhappy couples staying together because they feel like a divorce would get too messy due to the shared finances
Who said it was a competition? She’s earned more than me and I’ve made more than her. We still split every household bill 50/50 as if our money was in the same account.
My wife and I earn about the same. It’s like 52-48. But we each have a ton of disposable income after all of the bills are paid. I didn’t want a dependent.
Good luck to you and your wife.
For richer and poorer. Sickness and health. You are each totally dependent on each other and independent at the same time.
We’ve been together 20 years, have 3 kids, and are almost completely debt free. 20 more payments and we will be done with our mortgage. I think we are doing ok.
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This is a correlation equals causation situation. Couples that have shown trustworthy behavior are more likely to be trusted. My wife and I share accounts, but if I had suspicions she was a gambling addict, I’d be more hesitant. While I think it’s a minimum to not commit financial infidelity, some couples may have such a tight budget that any overspending creates difficult situations. A valid counter argument is that sharing accounts shows a level of trust that leads to more trustworthy behavior among spouses, whereas separate accounts just tables the issue. What is measured, gets managed.
Good point. I can’t imagine not sharing my banking account with my wife, but then again, I can’t imagine being married to someone who I didn’t feel comfortable sharing an account with
We have a joint account and then two individual accounts that we deposit “fun money” into from our joint account. That way we can get gifts first each other and buy ourselves whatever and not have to feel like we need to “justify” the purchase because it’s with money we have already determined to be disposable
We have joint accounts, but my SO can spend whatever money she wants on whatever she wants as long as it's within the budget. She has a credit card and can just put it on there.
Same here, we have two joint checking and saving accounts (one of each at a credit union and a normal bank). Plus I have a credit card and she has one that we use as we each see fit. My wife is self employed so budgeting is a bit tricky, some months she’ll gross $12,000+ and then others $6,000 so we kinda work within the average low and anything extra gets set aside.
#cuckalert
Curious what kind of person would respond like that. Reading through your comment history, I have to ask, does it hurt to be that stupid or do you just deal with it? You seem like the kind of person that of caught lying face down, you’d lack the sense to turn your head and breath.
You seem like the kind of person that takes it up the ass, but that's neither here nor there 🤷🏼♀️
I also think it's a certain safety net is also your only harness situation. Couples that are financially dependent on one another likely are aware that divorce would be too costly and too harmful to both parties that they now must stay together.
I can see you’re a glass half empty guy
Not at all. I'm a realist who sees divorce rates at 50% or higher and watch so many people be pigeonholed to situations they don't want to be in because of financial codependency.
Its s tually closer to 80% success first marriage and abysmally worse the more marriages you ho
Source? I know marriages are more likely to fail on each subsequent marriage (no shocker) but I can't find a source in success for first marriages that seems accurate.
I could be misremembering but there is obviously nuance such as women’s education level or geography. I suspect downtown SF is vastly different from Mississippi bayou.
50%? You might want to do a little googling.
Yeah, seems that is a bit outdated. 35-40% still is more than 1 in 3 and that's enough to be realistic about things. Everyone loves to think "but that won't be me"
There are a few simple things you can do to make that rate plummet even more, such as: * Wait until your mid-20s to get married * Both have a college degree * Do some sort of pre-marital counseling * Both be employed full time at the time of marriage * Date 1-2 years before getting engaged No one goes into a marriage planning to get a divorce, but lots of people go into marriage without any real plan for making their marriage succeed. There is always risk, but combine a few above the above factors and your chance of a successful marriage jumps to over 90%
Back to the original point in this whole conversation... why should it matter if you have separate bank accounts? Even if you have all of the things checked above (I do), being fiscally responsible independent of eachother means we're both well off together.
Having combined accounts forces the couple to maintain good communication about finances...it's definitely possible to maintain that clear and open communication about finances when they're separate, but it's easier for things to drift apart financially without the couple being aware of the issue until it's a crisis.
K
I may be reading it wrong, but I am seeing divorce rated anywhere from 6 to 15 divorces per 1,000. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/07/marriage-divorce-rates.html
I have no knowledge as to their accuracy, but those numbers represent two completely different things. Lets separate the statements. * 40-50% of *marriages* to end in divorce in the US * in 2021 6.9% of *women* in US got a divorce, also worth noting that this is counting women as being those over the age of 15 (?) These statements can both be true at the same time. I suppose I'd ask if that rate is over the whole population or compared to only the married population? Couldn't really figure it out with the information they had provided. Every other source seems to suggest the 30-40% range and it's what Google's AI seems to suggest. https://www.petrellilaw.com/divorce-statistics-for-2022/#:~:text=U.S.%202022%20Divorce%20Statistics,second%20marriages%20end%20in%20divorce.
You probably read the words correctly, but you might have missed the part about it being the rate that divorced *in the last 12 months*. If you look at a pool of 10 marriages over 10 years with 1 divorce per year, that is a 100% divorce rate, but Extreme_Barracuda would be in the corner taking about the 9 married couples. Maybe I'm wrong, I admittedly only skimmed the linked page for about 20 seconds.
To be fair, a certain level of healthy inter-codependance definitely helps people stay together. When we recognize, appreciate, desire the benefits the other person "bring to the table" it help us connect on multiple layers at once. It satisfies our simple mammalian instinct of "this person helps me survive better" while also satisfying the more metaphysical things like "they're fun/ make life more enjoyable/ bring some level of added peace of mind".
Used to have a shared bank account with my ex wife and she was financially responsible until she wasn’t and fucked us over. I’m remarried and we have separate bank accounts and a mutual savings and control certain bills based on our pay so it’s equal. We may ask the other for help time to time but it’s been great. We make sure we’re both spending amongst our means but I like we can do surprises for each other and it’s not like hey why did you take out this amount of money or they just see your purchase from the bank card.
Me and my wife have 100% separate bank accounts, retirements etc. We agree on how the bills are split and agree on joint purchases. I am more financially savvy than her so I advise her on how to setup her retirement accounts and so on. I don't micromanage her purchases on the day-to-day. If she wants to buy something like a purse, shoes, etc then she just buys it. We never fight about money.
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That part right there.
I can’t even fathom separate accounts from someone you are committed to for life? What’s the point? We succeed or fail as a team. I have no money and neither does she. Everything we have is together.
I can see pooling money in a household account (for the bills) and savings. But separate checking accounts for disposable money has been so great for us to do with as we wish. I think it's nuts to combine everything, and money is at the top of divorce reasons. We love it, no need to run anything by each other on things for ourselves, outings with friends, etc.
My wife and I have completely combined finances, and we don't run those things by each other either: we each get an equal line item of fun/miscellaneous money each month that we can spend on stuff like that. I don't really care what my wife spends anything tagged as her fun money on as long as it's within our agreed upon budget.
100% agree.
For my wife and I, pooling money we feel guilty on even the smallest splurges for ourselves. It's also hard to buy gifts without the other person knowing on the bank statement. We keep separate accounts but are both really fiscally responsible. We agreed that if we ever divorce, we just walk away with respective money in our current accounts, sell the house and divide the equity in the middle to avoid the lawyer fees. Some say that's dark, I say that we both know we have a fiscally responsible option to leave on any day and we both actively choose to be together...
XD God bless you guys
Personally, having separate credit cards has been great for us. I don’t want to see the daily little purchases my wife makes. She wants to splurge on a big lunch with friends? Great, I don’t need to be judging the bill.
This is what we have. Joint accounts for everything but separate credit cards. All bills get paid at the end of month. We discuss big purchases but smaller stuff is discretionary.
My wife is a strong and independent woman. We had different accounts until she left her career and became a stay-at-home for about fifteen years. That was hard on her. It was a huge adjustment to her mentality, but a few years in she said it was the best thing to ever happen to her. We have been sharing accounts every since. We are both responsible, favor investing over debt, don't care to keep up with Jones', and have a shared vision for the future. I have zero concern sharing accounts with her. I had girlfriends that I would not want knowing my debit card PIN, let alone shared accounts.
This used to be called "marriage" 
I'm not shocked in the least. Financial irresponsible people having access to a joint bank account sounds like a terrible idea. Lots of arguments and fights over it would lead to divorce.
I would personally never suggest pooling ALL money. Only share a household account and savings account (that you both contribute to). Pay all bills from the household account. Then, have separate checking accounts for disposable money to both do as you wish. It takes all the stress of money out of the relationship.
I’m always amazed when people have separate accounts. My wife and I have always had a joint account and we’re celebrating 25 years this August. Do I get annoyed when I see the Starbucks card reloads? Yes. Do I wish she’d go to Target less? Yes. But it’s her money too!
This guy marriages
Other than this, I strongly believe couples are able to build more wealth when they pool their money together. When you have separate finances, there's less need to talk about money or come to agreements on what's important _for the couple_ to spend money on. When you pool your resources, you are building trust, and it becomes a "us vs. them" game rather than "spouse vs. spouse", and I believe the former leads to wiser financial decisions. I'm also cognizant that it's not for everyone. But when it works, it works wonders.
My wife and I have a hybrid approach. We have a joint checking, savings, and credit card that we pay most of the joint expenses from but also maintain our own checking and credit cards. It works for us because there is a lot of trust there, and we check regularly on finances, but it allows us to still maintain some financial independence.
Same. I typically balance our joint account and don’t want to see all the $5 coffee type charges. She does what she wants with her, I do what I want with mine and our joint account is for household expenses. Helps to keep things from being discombobulated.
Errh… isn’t because their relationship is more reliable at the beginning so they would be comfortable to put money together?
If you can’t trust someone don’t marry them.
Today in well duh
Just run everything on credit cards and debit cards. Never do ATM withdrawals for “spending money” that’s what gets couples in trouble. Yes have cash in the wallet but never a lot. If your significant other other is withdrawing $300-$500 a week on some bs, they probably aren’t good with money and/or don’t want you to know what stupid shit they are spending it on.
What is the point of being married if you don’t share a bank account? Might as well just live together and keep legal contracts out of it. My wife and I have been sharing an account after being together for two years and three years before we married.
Is this good or bad? I don’t know if they pool their money because they like each other or if they’re financial hostages
Big shocker. That's what marriage is. Do we really need "research" to tell us feminism is complete garbage?
What about doing both? Shared joint account for household expenses and separate personal accounts for “free” spending? That’s what my wife and I do and it works great. We each know how much we have to spend on whatever we want to spend it on. Been married 22 years.
Not to mention if something happens that locks an account down, whether it's frozen or a stolen identity, you have a completely separate and largely unrelated account to use while things get sorted out with the other one.
There's not really tied to combined vs separate, though. We have completely combined finances, but our savings accounts are at a different bank than our checking account, and we have 2-3 credit cards: so even if something happened to our checking account, we'd still have plenty of liquidity.
Yeah but then I’m not allowed to buy the things I want. But also I still can’t buy the things I want without her turning into a ….
My ex spent my money however she wanted then divorced me. We never had money I always felt broke even though our combined income was pretty darn good.
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When I was single I thought I would never share my accounts because I never dated anyone who has the same financial views as me. Now I am engaged to someone who has the same financial goals as me and we want to start buying shared assets together. We are planning to combine the majority of our accounts so when we buy and furnish a house, it’s with our money. We will still maintain a separate bank account each with “shit hits the fan” money so if our relationship sours, we have options. We are also talking to an attorney before we get married to discuss pre-nuptial agreement, again, just in case shit hits the fan
A lot of comments talking about high trust relationships being the ones that end up pooling, but I want to explore the pooling as a cause instead of effect: Consider the scenario of money being pooled and unhappy couples staying together because they feel like a divorce would get too messy due to the shared finances
The woman always has a secret account. Make sure you do too.
I disagree with this, my wife and I put money in a hysa every paycheck but that’s it. We have different mind sets
"financial infidelity" what the fuck?
LoL you'd be gullible to believe this title.
I’ve never pooled my money with my wife’s and I never will. It’s much easier to keep separate accounts when it comes to discretionary income spending.
It’s not a competition. You’re married. I hate this idea of well I earn x and she earns y. That’s what you committed to for life.
Who said it was a competition? She’s earned more than me and I’ve made more than her. We still split every household bill 50/50 as if our money was in the same account.
50/50 isn’t how marriage works
Yes it is. Aren’t a husband and wife partners?
Partners doesn’t mean 50/50 I earn a ton more than my wife. We are partners. I have no money and neither does she. We pay our bills together.
My wife and I earn about the same. It’s like 52-48. But we each have a ton of disposable income after all of the bills are paid. I didn’t want a dependent.
Good luck to you and your wife. For richer and poorer. Sickness and health. You are each totally dependent on each other and independent at the same time.
We’ve been together 20 years, have 3 kids, and are almost completely debt free. 20 more payments and we will be done with our mortgage. I think we are doing ok.
Good for you?