Me and my fiancee are planning to get married soon, but only recently we decided to talk about money. I am 27 and she is 28. I'm in a solid and secure job as a teacher, and I earn fairly well. She is just beginning her masters degree, and is expecting to get a scholarship soon. If she starts receiving this scholarship, she will earn a little less than 1/3 of what I earn.

I understand that when you get married, both incomes become the couple's income. But I'm a little upset, and I told her, that she had in mind that we would get married, and she'd only be responsible for part of the expenses, as in I would have to pay for more stuff than her.

She has this kind of annoying way of creating facts out of small examples. For instance, she mentioned this friend of hers that got married with insecure sources of income, and the marriage is working. Also this other friend, whose salary summed with her husband's salary is not a lot, but things work. In her mind, if two or three couples that she knows are married and (apparently) well, then our marriage is gonna work.

We went through a list of expenses we would have together, and reached a conclusion that our incomes summed up wouldn't be enough. That's because I would then be responsible for my expenses and her expenses, with just a little financial help of part of her income.

Although she acknowledged that I was right about not being able to get married at the moment, she said she was sad, because she would only be able to work in her area after at least two years. She still says that she hasn't changed her mind, and she believes that with our income together, we can work it out. I am worried about our conflicting opinions.

What do you think, is it possible to estimate what is a good income to get married? What problems different incomes can bring to the couple? What do you think about the general situation?
user
fiancee believes
assistant
Me and my fiancee are planning to get married soon, but only recently we decided to talk about money. I am 27 and she is 28. I'm in a solid and secure job as a teacher, and I earn fairly well. She is just beginning her masters degree, and is expecting to get a scholarship soon. If she starts receiving this scholarship, she will earn a little less than 1/3 of what I earn.

I understand that when you get married, both incomes become the couple's income. But I'm a little upset, and I told her, that she had in mind that we would get married, and she'd only be responsible for part of the expenses, as in I would have to pay for more stuff than her.

She has this kind of annoying way of creating facts out of small examples. For instance, she mentioned this friend of hers that got married with insecure sources of income, and the marriage is working. Also this other friend, whose salary summed with her husband's salary is not a lot, but things work. In her mind, if two or three couples that she knows are married and (apparently) well, then our marriage is gonna work.

We went through a list of expenses we would have together, and reached a conclusion that our incomes summed up wouldn't be enough. That's because I would then be responsible for my expenses and her expenses, with just a little financial help of part of her income.

Although she acknowledged that I was right about not being able to get married at the moment, she said she was sad, because she would only be able to work in her area after at least two years. She still says that she hasn't changed her mind, and she believes that with our income together, we can work it out. I am worried about our conflicting opinions.

What do you think, is it possible to estimate what is a good income to get married? What problems different incomes can bring to the couple? What do you think about the general situation?
user
I earn
assistant