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FOR MUCH OF MY ADULT life, I’ve read about marriages in turmoil because the wife earns more than her husband. That’s always bewildered me, because I spent most of my career being a very happy trailing spouse.
My wife and I met in our early 30s while trying to rescue a three-year-old stuck on an elevator. This was more than three decades ago. I was divorced and working as a journalist, and had taken my son with me when I needed to drop by the newsroom early one weekday evening. My future wife was the personnel director at the newspaper—the term “human resources” wasn’t yet in vogue—and she happened to be working late.
I told my son to wait by the elevator while I darted around the corner to speak to a colleague. Alone for perhaps a minute, he punched the elevator button, got on alone, and then naturally punched the bright red emergency button a few seconds after the doors closed. He was stuck, I was in a panic and my wife-to-be came to the rescue. She hurried from her office, quickly assessed the situation, and spent the next half hour calmly working with building management and the fire department to successfully free my son.
It took a few weeks, but I eventually worked up the courage to ask her out. A scant few months later, we were engaged and, a year after meeting, we married. And like the elevator holding my tiny son, we were on the move.
We left Kentucky, our home state, less than a year later. My wife had accepted a promotion in Kansas City. The editor of the newspaper in Kentucky told me I was making a mistake leaving my job as the sports editor, but my gut told me what to do—follow my heart.
We lived in Kansas City for five years, where I enjoyed a happy stint in The Kansas City Star newsroom. Again, opportunity knocked for my wife: another promotion, this time in New York City. There, I got employment in a shrine I’d always dreamed about: The New York Times.
A journalist for 15 years, I had a couple of years earlier migrated to technology, specifically training journalists on software to produce the newspaper electronically. This was the 1990s—and, in hindsight, the beginning of the end for print media. My career change served me well.
My wife got another promotion soon after the New York move. Just a year after joining the Times, I left to join her in Europe, where we enjoyed the next six years as expats: four years in London, a quick hop to Geneva for a year and then back to London for a final year. Shortly after the move to Europe, I landed on my feet again, working for global news and financial giant Reuters.
We returned to Kentucky in 2001, six months before the 9/11 terrorist attacks. With our once-healthy retirement accounts decimated amid the 2000-02 financial meltdown, we had to get back to work. Despite her international success, returning to the States meant my wife had to accept an HR position several levels below her previous positions. But as always, her talent and drive got her to the top HR job at the state’s flagship university within a few years.
We just celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary. I’m retired, and she’s mostly retired. I’ve been asked over the years if I found it difficult to accept that my wife earned multiples of my salary, if the power dynamic made me feel inferior. I always reply, “Are you kidding?”
From the start, I’ve been proud of my wife—in awe of her, really—and her career moves created superb opportunities for me as well. We’ve had wonderful adventures together. I could quite possibly be the happiest trailing spouse ever.
Tony Wilson spent most of his career working as a journalist and then newsroom technology trainer at news organizations in Kentucky, Kansas City, New York City, London and Geneva. He finished his career as the translations planner at printer manufacturer Lexmark.
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My wife makes more than me, too. It’s worked out just fine for us…and me. 😉
But the truth is there are some good psychological or evolutionary reasons why many struggle with this dynamic. As always, I can only hope people find a way to work it out.
Nice story Tony. Marriage is a series of compromises, changes, adjustments, … sounds like you managed it wel – and married a winner (like I did).
I’m always amazed that people ask such rude questions . Congratulations on your happy marriage !
Great! Being with someone who has talent and appreciating them is a blessing!
Good going you two!
My marriage made us a team. Why wouldn’t I root for my wife to succeed, in every way? That includes in employment — job satisfaction, advancement, compensation, and any other job metrics. I also benefitted from that – it contributed to our happiness and I indirectly gained from her financial success.
(And to add an aside, why wouldn’t a married man become a huge supporter of equal pay for equal work, when he knows that sex discrimination would harm his wife (and any daughter(s) he has), and realizes that every dollar stolen from his wife is actually being stolen from him, too.)
Love your essay, Tony. Husbands who feel threatened if their wives make more $$ mystify me. Marriage isn’t a competition; it’s a team effort, isn’t it? As long as both people are happy in their roles and happy that the other is happy, who cares who makes more? But maybe some people don’t realize how they feel until that particular pay situation arises. It would have bummed me out to learn my husband had any negative feelings about all my hard work resulting in my paycheck going up.
We’ve joked for years about my wife making 2x what I do. We’re a team and our combined incomes are important. It’s never been an issue.
Maybe if we were competing at the same job or had different spending habits it would be different.
I would think it is becoming more common for a wife to earn more than her husband than it has been in the past. Still, if and when the couple have children, much of the initial time relating to the birth of the child and the following child raising efforts still seems to fall to the wife and mother and may put extra stress on the marriage.
I was happy to read that you have been successful in dealing with that stress. My guess is your experiences during your working years will serve you both well as you move through retirement.
Any suggestions from your experiences for grandparent’s actions when your married children are in a similar situation? My wife and I strive to focus on the grand children and let our adult children make the adult decisions about their own marriage.
Thanks for the article. Best, Bill
Sounds like a great life, and kudos on your attitude. My first husband was not exactly happy when my salary exceeded his (we had very similar jobs). It would have been a red flag except I already knew the marriage had been a mistake.
Tony … very interesting post.
I guess some guys ‘egos’ are tied into making more salary & benefits than their wives.
Except for when she was a ‘stay-at-home’ mom taking care of our children, my wife ALWAYS had a larger pay package than I did.
It never bothered me me.
Her retirement income – pension & SocSec – is higher than mine too.
I guess I’m just not competitive enough to care.
For those who are wondering … we’ve been married over 40 years.
Very interesting story, a topic I don’t thing I’ve ever read about before. Sounds like an exciting life indeed. I’m thinking about how I would react in your situation. The reality is our lives are so different I can’t.
Your story opened my eyes to how different lives and marriages can be. I have lived all my life within five miles of where my family has been since way before the Civil War, I worked for one employer nearly 50 years and my wife was not employed outside the home while raising our four children.
I seem to be rather boring actually.