This article at Yahoo Finance, When Fights Over Money Ruin Marriages, brings up different money problems that arise in marriages.  I know that money can be an instigator occasionally, but some of these problems sound like symptoms of bigger issues. Here’s what they listed and my personal take:

1. Paycheck Envy – I don’t know about you all, but my husband would dance a jig if I made more than him. If you and your spouse truly see your money as joint money, than who makes more wouldn’t matter, right? Feel free to explain something I’m missing…

2. Debt – I can understand fighting if one person keeps accruing debt while the other keeps trying to pay it off. In that case, I’d have to leave…I can’t stand lies and fighting joint progress feels like a lie of some sort.

I can also understand a general feeling of helplessness that leads to lashing out at each other. Both of these scenarios sound like a living nightmare to me. If hubby and I had high interest debt, I’d probably get a little pissy in general, but we’d sit down and make a payoff plan. Taking action sounds way better than fighting about it.

3. Bills – The article says that fights occur because one person usually pays the bills and is unhappily surprised by the other one’s spending. I can tell you from a recent personal experience, this does happen once in a while for us. I’m the bill payer since hubby had no interest in the details, but that means that the weeks he splurges on fast food annoy the crud out of me. I am slowly learning to ease up on the control freak behavior…hubby is a patient man.

4. Saving – A thrifty person married to a spendthrift is going to lead to problems. Even though hubby spends more than me, I can easily say he is no spendthrift. Thankfully. I just don’t see how it would work out very well. Does anybody have any personal experiences with this? Did any of those end well?

5. Investing – Okay, I can totally see this as being a little problem. I don’t personally care much about the specific stocks we are invested in, but I much rather invest in target date mutual funds than individual stocks anyway. Hubby rather invest more in high dividend equities. We have reached a compromise that works for us – my 401(k) and our Roth IRA are in target date funds and we have a Scottrade account for specific equity investments that my husband is in charge of. So far, this is working out really well. Have you ever had these types of issues? How did you work it out?

6. Differing Expectations – This isn’t just a fiscal problem…if each spouse has different expectations, there will be fighting. Hubby and I met when we were 18. There is nothing more eye-opening than developing into an adult while being engaged for 4 years. We have learned over the years to voice our opinions and expectations instead of assuming the other one will just know. See, you’d think that would be obvious, but selfish kids do not understand that everybody doesn’t think the same way they do, lol. Ah, the importance of communication.

7. Secret Stash – This screams “issues” to me. I would understand squirreling away money for a surprise gift or something like that, but just having “backup” cash seems hinky. Again, if there’s something I’m missing here, please give me a heads up.

What do you think? Any suggestions or comments about the above?