267. "She makes 2x more than me. I feel ashamed."

Money For Couples with Ramit Sethi - Ramit Sethi

A couple confronts financial insecurity and gender dynamics after the wife earns twice as much as her husband. Through a structured money conversation, they reframe their goals, align on shared values, and build confiden

Key takeaways

• Money is not a zero-sum game

Transcript preview

When are you going to be rich? I'm not talking metaphorically. I want a date. What month and what year are you going to have a million dollars? Two million, five hundred thousand, be debt free, or just be able to take a vacation without worrying about the price of Kalamari? Well, I'm hosting a free live event on July 13th. I'm going to help you answer that exact question. You can save your seat at IWT.com slash live event. At this point he has to work forever. I'm I'm going to spend all of that time alone? What do you think the solution is? They make more money. Oh my God, so if she makes like double that I make. For me it's not comfortable, that's how I feel. Is it because she makes more, and she's a woman? Yeah. We've been having this conversation for years. Ah, I feel ashamed. He's just been in survival mode. And it definitely would feel more comfortable for me too if he was able to contribute more. I work so hard. I'd to the left side, not the right side. What if you never make as much as Maria? Okay, she makes more money, but I was supposed to be the one taking the lead. You would like him to make more, but you also mentioned that you want him to be able to not work all the time and take time off. Yeah, yeah. Can you be a leader if she makes more money than you? What would you do if you had a solid retirement plan, but your partner did not? How would you handle it? Maria and Andrea is 53 years old Andre is 50 and Maria is happy with her retirement But Andre only recently opened up his retirement account for reasons that might surprise you Let me take a look at their application Maria writes Andre is a recent immigrant and has no savings or assets I'm concerned about his ability to contribute to our retirement as a teacher who's been saving I have a good job and a solid retirement plan but it's not really enough for two The question I have is what would you do in this situation if you were only eight years away from your retirement? That's what I'm here to find out today. Let's get started and meet Maria and Andre. We've been together for over five years now and I was hoping things that would be more cohesive by now. Okay, Andre did you know that she was applying? Yeah, right. Okay. And what was your take on it? Were you supportive or not? The first time I wasn't supported about that. So I was thinking like so I was so I was so I don't so I don't so I don't so I don't so I don't so I don't so I don't so I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't. So I don't want to think like so I don't. my financial life to a podcast for example. Yeah. I was a little bit resistant about that. I'm working with a therapist. We talk about that all the time and she helps me a lot to see the things differently and then I said so why not? Now I can build a career here in the United States and I want to be more active in our lives, you know? It's like making a good amount of money and and managing this money the way that gonna be a benefit for both of us. Okay. Where did you move here from? From Brazil. Okay and how long ago was that? It was 12 years ago. 12 years. All right. Do you have your green card or what's the ability to work right now? Yeah now I have my green card. Okay. How long ago did you get that? September 2025? Recent. Recent? Recent. Recent. daughter. She lives in Brazil with her mom. Got it. What do each of you do for a living? Work as a HVac guy, but when it requires a license, I have my boss with me to help me out. So I'm working on my license now. I've been a teacher for over 20 years. I work with adults. I have students from 18 years old to 60 years old. And it's very fulfilling work for me. Great. Yeah. Cool. My mom was a teacher as well. And my mother-in-law as well. So, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, That's awesome. Okay. Andre I'm curious about your work experience and the income. Were you able to work before you received your green card? Yes. I was working as a subcontractor and I had a company. They used to pay me by I don't know the words like Commission. Okay. How does the income you made then compare to the income that you make now? So basically I think that is about the same because before I was like as a subcontractor but it was like all the expenses that I was like all the expenses that I had it was on me car, gas, helper, insurances and everything. So it's about the same thing. I feel shaped sometimes because I'm putting all my effort on it to make more money, to manage the money, to get a nice result, but I know that I'm far away from that. I see. And I don't feel comfortable about that. And have you saved for retirement? Not that much. Okay. How much are we're talking about. How much. How much are? How much are we're talking about? How much. How much are. How much are we're Now we have like $16,000. Okay, that's your retirement. Yeah, this is my retirement. Got it. So what is the crux of the question here today? Maria, you applied. What are you hoping to get out of today's conversation? I feel concerned for Andre's situation. He hasn't really been in a place where he felt like he could make a plan for retirement. Like he's just been in survival mode. Are you in survival still? I think so. Okay. We're together and we recently combined finances, but I only recently started thinking about retirement in the last few years and I feel like I have a good plan that covers like one person's life. With him in the picture, it just makes it a lot tighter to try and to do, to have like a future together on basically one income. I still working on it, so it's a very beginning of my career. I would like to get paid, but it's enough to pay for my bills and send some money for retirement, but that's it. Okay. Can we take a look at the numbers? Yeah. Okay. What was it like coming up with this conscious spending plan together? It was fun. Yeah, I like it. And I'm glad you speak more about it. Yeah, for me it was a totally challenging thing. My main concern was like, make money. manage the money I was like okay I need my bills are about four thousand dollars I need to make more than a thousand this is very common it's like common across almost every culture that I speak to yeah every country every culture the guy is single-minded I need to just make more money it's classic okay so that was your mindset yeah and then looking at these numbers what did you notice I noticed that a certain way of making more money sense, but if I manage the money, I can get a better life. Nice! Honestly, that's a huge insight. Okay, let's take a look at the numbers. Maria, can you read off the word in bold and the number next to each of these items, please? Assets, 44,000 investments, 454,000, savings, 3,500, debt, 3,600,000,000,000,000,000, Total net worth? 496,900. What do you think about those numbers? I need a few thousand more to hit that half a million. You might get it by the time we leave this room. It's true, it's true. When I was looking at this just as my plan, I felt really good about it because I also have a pension that will cover at least half of my salary. Let's talk about you and what you feel about these numbers. Yeah, how do I feel about them? I feel really proud and grateful and grateful and happy. Cool. Andre how do you feel about these numbers? I don't feel comfortable about that because I know that most of the money that is there it comes from her. I don't feel that I'm contributing enough for that. I could be I could do it better. Let's look at the income. Andre can you read off your combined gross monthly income? 15,600 a month. A month. So around $187,000 now per year. and then it looks like it's going to go up $201,000 soon. Mine's going up, maybe we haven't put, we don't know how much his would go up yet, so we haven't added that. Oh, okay. So in other words, you're going to jump up by $14,000 a year in a few months and probably more considering Andre's gonna get his license. Yes. All right, great. What do you think about that number? time I feel that I should be like the percentage that I was contributing with that should be much better. She makes 10,500 and you make about half of that. 5,000. This is uncomfortable for me. Uh-huh because you're making less. Yeah. Why? I feel like that I'm starting my career again. Mm-hmm. And as a man I don't feel comfortable with that. So. Because? I know that she doesn't put me in... charge of this. She's very very gentle and understanding with me but my feelings I like oh my God so she makes like double that I make you know it's like for me it's not comfortable that's how I feel. Is it because she makes more and she's a woman? Yeah okay got it in Brazil do men typically make more than we make more money? Okay and are they in charge of the finances? Yes. All right let's take a look at the numbers your fixed costs are at 68 percent. It was lower before we combined. Mine was lower before we combined. But we do live in a high cost to living area. All right, let's look at the rest. Investments at 12%. Is that accurate? A lot of my savings comes out pre-tax. So the savings rate is actually much higher for me. Oh, because of the... It's more like 25%. Yeah. What? I've been saving... Aggressively the last few years because I just started. And is that reflected here when it says 23%? Oh not the savings then investing the investing is much higher. It's not showing up here because it's pre-tax. Okay fine and then savings it says that of your income you are saving 23% is that accurate? It was until a few months ago but it's probably more like it took that down to 1200 a month. Yeah. It says 17 right now. Yeah. You took it down? So yeah because I'm not having been saving for the wedding for the wedding. the kids and I haven't been saving for the car maintenance so that's 500 less. What do you do with the money now? We've been having some extra expenses lately like taxes like taxes and I never had big taxes before but I got one of those this year. Why did you not have the high tax bill and now you do? I'm making a lot more than I was until recently and last year I sold a house so that offset my income a lot. Maria you mentioned that you were able to recently a lot of money. How did you do that? Oh, well I made a lot of big changes in my career. I went back to school. I was able to, my kids fledged, so that was the big life change, is that I could focus on my career. It was never a priority before that. So I put myself through grad school twice, and then I asked for a promotion and they were like, tell us what you want. It was really cool because that was my first experience of like, wow, I get to decide to decide what I want to decide what I want to decide what I want to decide what I want to decide what I want to decide what I want to awesome. And then I did that again when I switched school districts and then this new raise that's coming up is also a promotion. I've been kind of like doing various proposals throughout the year and then I and I said there's all these things that I want to do can I do them and get paid for it and she was like definitely. Whoa. And it was a 10% promotion so it was awesome. You know what well done. I love that you've been doing it consistently over and I love that you've have done this most recently as a teacher because one of the common critiques I get when I talk about increasing your income is hey I'm a teacher or I work for the government this won't work for me and while there are paybands and there's certain things that private industry doesn't have there are ways to get creative whether it's doing what you have done or starting a side business I think it's amazing what you've accomplished well done what do you think of these numbers? Are you familiar with the conscious spending plan? Yeah, we go over it like once a month at least. Really? Yeah, great. You sit down and you... We sell out on a computer and they go over and she tried to... She goes like, she's the manager, she goes, she goes like, she's the manager, she goes, she goes like, what's going on, and I tried my best to understand what's going on. Okay. And what would be an example where you try to follow it to follow it. the conscious spending plan on a day-to-day basis. Not spending money on things that I wasn't supposed to expand because for example before I'm a big fan of going to bakeries. Okay. For example and go. What do you get? I like chocolate things and things like that so nice streets. All right. And I was doing that every weekend for example and when I when I go there I don't care about money I don't ask for how much you gonna cost I just give it to me. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm not. And I'm not doing it. anymore. We do sometimes when we think that makes sense, but not like before, like another thing like spending money outside of home, for example, I used to go every day to have like lunch somewhere else or going to a gas station and get like snacks, things like that, and pizza and things like that. That's actually a great use of the conscious spending plan. I love what you said. It's like, I used to just go to these places and not. think about money at all. And now we have the conscious spending plan. Sure I can still go once in a while, but in general I'm not going every day mindlessly, unconsciously. That is exactly the point of the conscious spending plan, so that's a great job. You've heard me talk about how one of my money dials is convenience, but one of my more recent money is health, which means I love spending money on things that make me healthier. This is why I pay for example for a It's why that I've worked with experts to learn how macros work for the foods that I eat. And what's great about the concept of money dials is you decide. And if health is one of your money dials, then I recommend checking out superpower. Superpower is a membership program that gives you real data and insights about your health. The process starts when they send a licensed professional to your home or you can visit a nearby lab. And with one lab test you get access to over a hundred biomarkers, things, things like cholesterol, cholesterol, iron, creatinine, sodium, cortisol, testosterone, to unlock a better understanding of your body. Basically to get a baseline, their app shares detailed information on your heart, liver, thyroid, hormones, metabolism, vitamin, and mineral levels, all tracked and assessed over your lifetime, not just a single snapshot. Make this the year you stop guessing about your health, with superpower. For a limited time, our listeners get $20 off to unlock their new health intelligence. Head over to super power. make sure you use code Rameith for $20 off your membership. That's code Rameith after you sign up. They'll ask you how you heard about superpower. Do me a favor and if you could tell them money for couples sent you to support this show. Two misconceptions about Rameet Satee. Number one he doesn't like Italian food. That's not true. I like pizza. Number two that I'm categorically against all financial advisors also untrue. I'm simply against paying a percentage of your portfolio a percentage of your portfolio. to an advisor. I would rather you pay a simple flat fee or an hourly rate. That is where our friends at FACET come in. FACET charges a flat membership fee for financial planning, never a percentage of your assets. You get access to a team of CFP professionals, always a CFP, always a fiduciary, who help you create a personalized financial plan that meets you where you are. They can help with big things like investments, moving across the country, saving for kids college, traveling, traveling in retirement retirement, estate planning, all of it. Your financial plan should match up with your rich life vision, and Fasset can help make that possible without the exorbitant fees. As of the date of this recording, Fasset is waiving the enrollment fee for new annual members, and for my audience, Fasset is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to Fasset.com slash Ramith to learn more about which membership option is best. for you. Facet is an SEC registered investment advisor. I'm not a member of Facet and have an incentive to endorse Facet as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement. All opinions are my own and not a guarantee of a similar outcome. You said it. I listened. A lot of you have been asking for me to do more around single people and money. It's time to do it. I am casting a new reality series about love and money. So if you are single and you live in LA, I want to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk to talk. to you go to IW.com slash dating show and if you got friends who are single in LA send them the link IWT dot com slash dating show let's talk about the disparity in income so right now Maria you earn a hundred twenty six thousand dollars a year and Andrea you make 61 k per year how do you feel about that Maria I know that it makes him feel uncomfortable and and it definitely would feel more comfortable for me to if he was able to contribute more I'm happy to do it if he's you know building his career and investing in himself that hasn't happened as quickly as I would have liked like we've been having this conversation for years. What was the conversation that you had? Basically like you need a plan so that you're not just spinning in survival mode and like he said he's still there so I need some kind of reassurance like this is actually gonna happen it's not gonna be like this forever. he needs a plan. What does that plan look like to you? The purpose of it, I'll start with that, is that he'd be in a position where he wasn't working all the time and stressed out and that he'd have more time to relax and enjoy life with me, like as it is now I do a lot of things for leisure that he doesn't, that he can't do, like he's working on Saturdays, he can't take time off, he doesn't have paid time off, things like that. So like we just, we just took our first, vacation together last in February all right in five years and it was the first time he had had a week off what did that feel like in 12 years like he doesn't do vacations wait are Brazilians connoisseurs of leisure when I talked to Italians they don't they love leisure they're the world's foremost experts at leisure what is it like for people in Brazil yeah we love leisure okay that's what I thought the situation before was my status working in my career. I can take like days off like because I don't have like a plane. I work for a company