Spendthrift DH
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Anonymous
The Bogleheads website is a financial/investing forum. I know there is a DC chapter that meets every other month. I haven't had a chance to go to a meet up yet though. A lot of bogleheads are savers and want to have a nice retirement. MisterMoneyMustache (MMM) is a bloger who retired early and is not a fan of the "keeping up with the Joneses" mentality. There is also a forum on his website. I remember seeing a post on a DC meetup a long, long time ago, but don't know if there have been recent meetups. Dave Ramsey preaches about getting out of debt. Although I don't completely agree with his advice, I think people following his plan are trying really hard to consume less and be more reasonable with their money. Dave Ramsey does have a religious slant, but I just ignore his advice on tithes etc. |
Anonymous
| Op, your attitude makes me cringe. |
Anonymous
OP here, it is funny you write this because I get along very well with very old Americans. They share my financial values. I don't think it is a gross generalization to say that the impulse of Americans under age 75 is to spend while the impulse of most Asians is to save. This is not to say one culture is better than another, but to the degree one wants to achieve financial freedom, the Asian approach tends to be better for that purpose. |
Anonymous
Not the OP, but if you ever lived with not knowing where the money was going to come from to pay for food, then you have no idea. Maybe she is obsessed with money, but better safe than sorry. Some of us are smart enough to know that food stamps and welfare or being forced to sell assets to pay for food is not a good way to live. |
Anonymous
Exaggerate much? Op won't have to worry about money for groceries, that's extreme. |
Anonymous
OP here, you know, just reading what you wrote brings tears to my eyes. I was always worried about money as a child and where we were, there was no welfare. We never had much and my parents did not shield me from that. I had never had brand new clothes until I moved to the US in my teens. Many Americans live on the brink, but have not experienced what life is like when one has truly fallen to the bottom. Having come from the bottom, I will not go back if I can help it. I cannot control the future, but I can control my actions. |
Anonymous
But you can't control the actions of another person. That's the problem. |
Anonymous
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Didn't take long for this thread to end up in the shitter.
I swear, no matter what a person is asking for help on, people are going to attack. Just absurd. |
Anonymous
Well, that is how I grew up, so not much exaggeration at all. Dad died, mom never worked. No savings, no social security for the first few months. New house with 17% interest rate bought 18 months before dad died. No income. No close family. All of my grandparents and all of my father's family was dead by then. You should feel very grateful if at the age of 10 you did not have your mother sobbing about how she had no idea how you were going to make it. Sounds like OP grew up with someone in her family that grew up like I did that taught her never to be without and to save, save, save and be debt free. My mother made sure I could always support myself and my family and harped on saving. Just saying, you are a product of your experiences. OP is a product of hers. |
Anonymous
+1. As long as he's working and not spending your money, I don't see the issue. While frugal, I spend a little more money on our house than DH would. Our understanding is that if I make money, I can spend it too. Don't be so stingy. I don't think you need to give money to inlaws though! I would draw the line there. |
Anonymous
Yup, we may be from different places, but my mom never shielded my brother and me. She made almost all of my clothes or they came from goodwill or K-mart if we needed new. She grew up in the depression, so when it came time to knuckle under, she could, not that she wanted to. She had no choice after my dad died. Dad had his own business, with debt and my mom discovered an employee had been embezzling funds from my dad. I think mom may have had 20 bucks to work with. She did it. And I am still very grateful she did. I married a spendthrift, but only after we max retirement. I am trying to get him to stop splurging on crap we don't need. We are drowning in stuff. |
Anonymous
PP you sound much more reasonable than OP |
Anonymous
| This is the problem with marrying someone with a completely different view on finances. It's hard to get someone to change. |
Anonymous
OP here, how do you manage what I imagine must be your irritation at his spending habits? |
Anonymous
PP, forgive me, but I don't know if you are being ironic or not. I think that my husband and I balance each other, but we have gotten to a point after 15 years of marriage where we can talk about spending $500 at Costco on stuff we don't need isn't good in the long run, when we are not saving for college for the kids. However, it sounds like OP and her H are on opposite ends of the spending tolerance, and maybe he married her because she can put limits on him and he can help her be more freewheeling. OP, btw, DH and I started out by making a pact that we each could spend $200 on something without advanced discussion. Anything more than that, and we had to talk it through. Now, since we both have had career changes and we have kids, I think we are down to about $25. |