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Two income households and money matters

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AUTHOR: R Quinn on 1/24/2025

As I read through the comments and posts on HD I often see a comment related to a spouse’s employment/retirement. Is a two income family as common as it appears to be?

How does a dual income impact financial and retirement planning? Is it easier or more complicated? Are family finances viewed as one pool or separate?

Are there conflicts when one spouse retires while the other works?

Are financial/Investment decisions made by individual or as one portfolio?

Seems like a two income household has its benefits and complications.

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kristinehayes2014
17 days ago
Reply to  R Quinn

The dates you mention in the first paragraph seem inconsistent. You say you were in the army when you got married in December of 1969 but that you got out of the army in August of 1969.

Rick Connor
17 days ago

My wife is a nurse and was able to work part-time while our children were young. When they reached high school she increased her hours, eventually going full time after they graduated. This helped a lot in paying for college, and she was also able to increase her retirement savings. During the last 20 years of her career she moved into management, and then a director level position, with appropriate salaries. This allowed her to fully fund her 401k and an HSA. We were also able to purchase a beach house in 2012, and help pay for 2 weddings.

Our finances have always been one pool. We have yearly “state of the union” meetings. We discuss any major purchase, investments or changes. Our investments are pretty vanilla – low cost index funds – so it’s not hard.
We had many extensive discussions about choosing to move closer to our children. But we were in complete agreement on that.

Like all families, there were compromises required. During years when I traveled she had to bear more of the home front burden. The only serious complication of a two income family that I can see is child care. But lots of families find ways to make it work.

Ben Rodriguez
17 days ago

We are a two-income family, both in our mid-40s. For reference neither of our parents’ homes were when we grew up in the 80s/90s.

How does a dual income impact financial and retirement planning? We plan to retire around the same time and consider all of our funds to be mutually ours.

Are family finances viewed as one pool or separate? One pool
Are there conflicts when one spouse retires while the other works? Don’t know yet.
Are financial/Investment decisions made by individual or as one portfolio?
Fortunately we don’t have too many “decisions,” but when there are any they are mutual. However, as you could imagine, my wife isn’t as interested in personal finance as I am. She’s interested in the results, but not the nitty gritty. I now handle all bills, which she’s grateful for.

Edmund Marsh
17 days ago

Those are great questions. For my wife and me, the monetary benefit of two incomes is substantial. Over 25 years of marriage, she worked full time for seven, a little over half-time for about two, then just few hours per month through the present. Quick math tells me her retirement contributions make up about 23% of our total. Add to that a Roth IRA which she started and we continued to fund out of my earnings.

We like to do things together, including retirement planning and other aspects of household finances. All money is pooled. We make final decisions together.

I wrote an article about the impact of dual incomes on retirement planning here.

Winston Smith
17 days ago

We had 2 incomes before our first child was born.  

And then again after our youngest got to 1st grade and could be at school during the day.

My wife stayed home with the kids.

We have always had only 1 checking account with all our income going into that.

We discuss all major purchases before buying anything.  “Impulse” purchases, less than $50 or so we just do.

My wife has a Masters in Finance with a specialization in Money and Banking.  She makes the FINAL decisions on where to invest after we discuss it.  We have never had any issues with that.

I keep track of our investments and day-to-day expenses because I am a detail oriented data geek.  

My wife pays all the bills. Most are on auto-pay now that we’re retired.

That works for us.  

We know other couples, including siblings, that do things differently.

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