Making SAHM get job to pay for private school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, I agree the word "make" her get a job is poor choice of language.

Some good advice here and to answer some questions: she has a good degree fromm an expensive private school (as do most of her friends who are SAH mom's) so she could go back to what she was doing before SAH and probably make 75-100k full time which after taxes would basically just lay for school.

The reason I mention that is because I wonder if she would still think private is worth it if she literally had to endure a year of all the nonsense they work brings just for the joy of saying out kids are in private school.

As others have pointed out, it's just as much about that I see private school as pointless. In fact, I probably have a bit of a chip about it since I started at my company with a dozen others, almost all of them from Ivy or southern Ivy (Duke, Candy) and I surpassed all of them. Most aren't even in the field anymore. Point being, where you go to college doesn't matter as much as people think unless you are in a super rare field that needs a pedigree (like a Supreme Court lawyer). Where you go to high school matters less and middle school?

If this was a cheap expense, then it wouldn't be a hill to die on but it's an enormous expense. Can I afford it? For sure. Does it mean I will work at least 3 more years over this, for sure.

I suppose it just comes down to a philosophical difference as to whether private is an actual benefit vs a country club status thing.

Advice on a productive conversation? Am I allowed to anonymously sneer that my wife's very expensive private school pedigree didn't exactly lead to a good ROI?

FWIW, I agree with you completely. I am also a product of public school (FCPS) and Virginia state colleges. So is my spouse. Even if one of us made what you do - and we don’t - there’s no way I would send bright kids to private without a really, really reason to do so like special needs. I would focus on paying for the undergrad and grad school that suits your kids best, which you can easily afford to do.

No way I would sacrifice retirement or work longer to send kids to private middle or high school. It’s just not a thing that we know and it’s not doing your kids a disservice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here, I agree the word "make" her get a job is poor choice of language.

Some good advice here and to answer some questions: she has a good degree fromm an expensive private school (as do most of her friends who are SAH mom's) so she could go back to what she was doing before SAH and probably make 75-100k full time which after taxes would basically just lay for school.

The reason I mention that is because I wonder if she would still think private is worth it if she literally had to endure a year of all the nonsense they work brings just for the joy of saying out kids are in private school.

As others have pointed out, it's just as much about that I see private school as pointless. In fact, I probably have a bit of a chip about it since I started at my company with a dozen others, almost all of them from Ivy or southern Ivy (Duke, Candy) and I surpassed all of them. Most aren't even in the field anymore. Point being, where you go to college doesn't matter as much as people think unless you are in a super rare field that needs a pedigree (like a Supreme Court lawyer). Where you go to high school matters less and middle school?

If this was a cheap expense, then it wouldn't be a hill to die on but it's an enormous expense. Can I afford it? For sure. Does it mean I will work at least 3 more years over this, for sure.

I suppose it just comes down to a philosophical difference as to whether private is an actual benefit vs a country club status thing.

Advice on a productive conversation? Am I allowed to anonymously sneer that my wife's very expensive private school pedigree didn't exactly lead to a good ROI?

Jesus, dude. How the hell do you live with that much contempt for your wife? WTF is your problem?

You need therapy to figure out why you hold your wife in such low regard. And why you have such a chip on your shoulder about the Ivy Leagues you surpassed. You sound insecure AF.

Oh, and btw, that ROI? Well, she married a dude who makes half a million and she doesn't have to work. So who's the *actual* intelligent one with a good ROI in your relationship?

Yup.

Aside from the obvious downside of living with someone who is secretly sneering at you.

[Anonymous]

I have so much crap in other areas of my life I am glad I can at least lean on my partner for support as he is respectful of me. I hope you mature enough to stop sneering at yout partner.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have so much crap in other areas of my life I am glad I can at least lean on my partner for support as he is respectful of me. I hope you mature enough to stop sneering at yout partner.

I am not sneering at my wife, she didn't choose private highschool, her parents did. I am sneering at the concert of people who think they are giving their kids some huge headstart by spending hundreds of thousands on private education when it gets them no further professionally.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do think it is a little ridiculous to both not work and insist on private school.

+1.

I predict that we’re going to see more threads like this as inflations gets worse and the upper middle class begins to drown.

This private school obsession that so many non wealthy families have is ridiculous.

Being a breadwinner on a w2 income is hard at in this day and age.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How can I force this issue or am I in the wrong? I am sole breadwinner, make about 500k so money isn't an issue but wife wants our 2 kids to go to private school for middle and high school. The school is about 30k per year. That's about $700k I'm pre tax money and not counting college.

I went to public school my whole life, including a good state school so my tuition from kindergarten through end of grad school was about the cost of one year of this middle school, combined. I think private school is a waste, unless you are in a bad school district or your kid has unique needs.

Leaving aside I could retire several years earlier if we sent the kids to the good, local public school, I feel my wife has lost the sense of what a dollar is. She isn't a spendthrift on other areas. I feel like if this is so important, then she can work with basically every penny she earns going to pay tuition.

How do I raise this without blowing things up?

If she goes back to work are you prepared to be the default parent for the next few years as she builds up her career and has very little vacation time to take? That means being home to do the after school and dinner duties. She gets to the be the one who drops off if necessary. It means grocery shopping and cooking. If means figuring out how the house gets clean and how the lawn gets mowed. It means scheduling and going to the doctors appointments. It means staying home when they are sick…

Give me a freaking break.

This post is ridiculous. Newsflash most women work

So many women on this forum just want to be taken care of and don’t want to work while calling all the shots.

Op you make the money so you have the final say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You must have some budget assumptions upon which you are saying that to afford $60K/yr of tuition you need a HHI of $700K. Do you and your DW agree on your annual budget? Or does your DW think that there's somewhere in your current spending that you can cut back?

There are plenty of people who pay for private school and college with a HHI of $500K, so it's not a matter literally not having enough money...it's a matter of priorities. You and your DW probably aren't aligned on other areas of spending either...and that's what you need to address instead of jumping to, "You need to find a job in order to educate our kids the way you think makes sense."

Also, you should try to understand her reasons for wanting private over public. They might be good ones. Your personal experience doesn't apply, even if you live in the same school district you grew up in since kids are different and schools change.

FWIW, I went to private growing up and DH went to only publics. When we were first thinking about schools, he had the attitude that "public was good enough for me, so it's fine". We both did a lot of research, and we ended up exploring both publics and privates. Our kids ended up in public for now, but we may reconsider. Importantly, though, we are having discussions about these things on the merits of the decisions for our kids...not on just wanting our kids to have the same experiences we did.

That’s not what OP is saying.

This is the longest response to a completely wrong deduction I’ve ever seen on DCUm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well my DH and I both work and our total HHI is $500k as well. We started sending our daughters to private in 6th grade and the total cost is $70k each year.

We make it work because we think their private is a million times better than their ‘top ranked’ public school was. And they need the personal attention that their private provides after not being in proper school for the past year and a half.

We do get half of their college expenses covered though, so that helps. You can do it on your salary alone OP!

The difference is you BOTH work!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have so much crap in other areas of my life I am glad I can at least lean on my partner for support as he is respectful of me. I hope you mature enough to stop sneering at yout partner.

I am not sneering at my wife, she didn't choose private highschool, her parents did. I am sneering at the concert of people who think they are giving their kids some huge headstart by spending hundreds of thousands on private education when it gets them no further professionally.

I think a lot of people think education is worth more than the professional advantages. I went to public school early, then private school (in a southern city with terrible public schools), and then a fancy private college. My kids go to public school (in MCPS). The education they get is nowhere near as good, in certain respects, as what I received as a kid. The biggest differences are in writing and choices in literature. When I was in school, we wrote constantly and were held to high standards. We learned about public speaking. And we read great works and were taught by teachers passionate about the writing. In college, I had my mind blown, and probably every day I think about something I learned in college, or something that I learned after college that came by way of my education. Could I have done that in public schools? Maybe. On the other hand, I think there is a huge advantage to being able to succeed in the public schools here and in the exposure to all sorts of people from diverse backgrounds.

Point being, maybe your wife's view of ROI considers returns other than money.

You snark that she just wants to brag about sending the kids to private school. If that's true, I'm on your side completely. If that's not true, it's a shitty way to characterize your wife, and I can see why she doesn't listen to you.

[Anonymous]

She probably wants to go private because as the sahm with your income, that’s what all her friends do. She’s screwed either way. If you send your kids to public her friends will look down on her and she’ll probably lose her friends as they grow closer with other parents at the private school. If you make her work, she will lose her sahm mom friends and it’s super hard to make new mom friends as a Jr high or HS mom. Mom friendships are forged when kids are young and need the moms to coordinate activities, camps, rides, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How can I force this issue or am I in the wrong? I am sole breadwinner, make about 500k so money isn't an issue but wife wants our 2 kids to go to private school for middle and high school. The school is about 30k per year. That's about $700k I'm pre tax money and not counting college.

I went to public school my whole life, including a good state school so my tuition from kindergarten through end of grad school was about the cost of one year of this middle school, combined. I think private school is a waste, unless you are in a bad school district or your kid has unique needs.

Leaving aside I could retire several years earlier if we sent the kids to the good, local public school, I feel my wife has lost the sense of what a dollar is. She isn't a spendthrift on other areas. I feel like if this is so important, then she can work with basically every penny she earns going to pay tuition.

How do I raise this without blowing things up?

If she goes back to work are you prepared to be the default parent for the next few years as she builds up her career and has very little vacation time to take? That means being home to do the after school and dinner duties. She gets to the be the one who drops off if necessary. It means grocery shopping and cooking. If means figuring out how the house gets clean and how the lawn gets mowed. It means scheduling and going to the doctors appointments. It means staying home when they are sick…

Give me a freaking break.

This post is ridiculous. Newsflash most women work

So many women on this forum just want to be taken care of and don’t want to work while calling all the shots.

Op you make the money so you have the final say.

Bingo! The entitlement, guiltripping and shaming is out of control. Horribly manipulative stuff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think it is a little ridiculous to both not work and insist on private school.

+1.

I predict that we’re going to see more threads like this as inflations gets worse and the upper middle class begins to drown.

This private school obsession that so many non wealthy families have is ridiculous.

Being a breadwinner on a w2 income is hard at in this day and age.

Oh, yeah, lots of tears for the UMC. I can tell this is OP, and his resentment for being the sole earner is sad. Surprised he can out the door to work with that huge chip on his shoulder.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I work in a public school. Absolutely get your kids into a good private school if you can. A lot of what I see horrifies me.

Also, consider how your wife getting a job will impact your career. Are you prepared to handle half of the pickups and drop offs? Half of the housework? Half of the childcare? What if she has to work weekends? Think about the impact this will have on your career. It likely makes more sense for her to remain a SAHM, rather than you taking over half of the duties and taking a career hit over $30k (6% of your salary).

His kids are teens - there is no “childcare.”

What are you talking about? There’s driving them to/from school, to activities, helping with homework, keeping on top of their schoolwork and with things the school needs (like paperwork, deadlines, etc), staying home with them when they’re sick, being able to leave work at a moments notice to get them, cooking dinner for the family, buying supplies, plus just spending time with your kids so they’re not alone and getting into trouble.

And that’s not even considering household responsibilities OP probably doesn’t do, like grocery shopping, cleaning, handling repairs, bills, paperwork, etc. He would have to take over half of that, too, so his evenings will be spent cooking, cleaning, handling logistics, etc.

Looks like a SAHM of teens has found this thread!

Nice try. But I’m a single mom who works full time. That’s how I know what the real value of a wife is - I would love to have someone who didn’t work and could handle all the household tasks. Sounds amazing to come home to a clean house and home cooked meal.

I hear you but please know that it can be single mothers who are the most sexist at times. You realize "wives" in 2 couple families are not all doing what you assume?

Not totally sure what you mean by that. I was a SAHM. Most of my friends are SAHMs. I know that for the most part, SAHMs (and SAHDs) do almost all the at home labor. This then frees up the working partner to advance their career. Never met a couple where the working parent does half or more of the at home labor (although I've met many who *think* they do and have no idea how much their SAH spouse does).

Of course things are divided differently when both parents work, although data is pretty clear that wives still do the bulk of home and childcare, even if they work full time.

Point is, if OP wants his wife to work, he needs to take a close look at how that will impact his career. When I was a SAHM, my xH wanted me to work. So I got a job. Then he freaked out because he was suddenly responsible for half of the pickups/dropoffs, half of dinners, getting DC ready in the morning, handling school things, etc. And he didn't have time for the things he enjoyed like working out. Even got upset he couldn't use the company car anymore (no kids allowed in it). But you don't get to have your cake and eat it, too - you don't get the benefits of a working wife AND a SAHM.

What I mean is that you seem to assume that wives are the ones who do household work. So, so many single mothers assume I am a SAHM. I am not. Not all wives are SAHMs. In fact, even though I am a woman, I am not the one to do more of the duties, we share. So, please don't make assumptions about me and my husband based on our genders.

This post is bizarre. Sure- blame all those single moms you know, for the patriarchy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:She probably wants to go private because as the sahm with your income, that’s what all her friends do. She’s screwed either way. If you send your kids to public her friends will look down on her and she’ll probably lose her friends as they grow closer with other parents at the private school. If you make her work, she will lose her sahm mom friends and it’s super hard to make new mom friends as a Jr high or HS mom. Mom friendships are forged when kids are young and need the moms to coordinate activities, camps, rides, etc.

You left off the option where she can manipulate him into paying for private, while still staying home against his reservations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:She probably wants to go private because as the sahm with your income, that’s what all her friends do. She’s screwed either way. If you send your kids to public her friends will look down on her and she’ll probably lose her friends as they grow closer with other parents at the private school. If you make her work, she will lose her sahm mom friends and it’s super hard to make new mom friends as a Jr high or HS mom. Mom friendships are forged when kids are young and need the moms to coordinate activities, camps, rides, etc.

You left off the option where she can manipulate him into paying for private, while still staying home against his reservations.

I didn’t leave it off. I fully expect that is what will happen. Having a spouse work when you make $500k is stupid. Having a sah spouse is a luxury that makes life much more convenient for the high earner.