Jobless Husband Wants to Be Compensated for Contributing More to Housework While Unemployed, Wife Disagrees

A husband wants to settle a dispute with his wife about whether he should be compensated for doing more housework after losing his job.

In a recent post shared on the popular AmItheA–hole (AITA) subreddit, a 30-year-old man begins his retelling of the incident with a question in the title: “AITA what did he ask my wife to ‘pay’ me to do housework?”

Then, at the beginning of the post, he explains that he and his wife (29) always shared household chores and financial responsibilities equally because they had similar salaries.

Now that he’s out of a job, he says he gets an unemployment check that’s 60% of his previous salary, meaning he can still contribute his usual share to household bills, but then he’d have “zero spending money” to enjoy.

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The husband does the work.

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“Now for the argument,” he continues. “My wife suggested that I could do a lot more work around the house now that I lost my job — and I agreed. I won’t sit around all day doing nothing, but I’ll still have a lot more free time than I or she did.”

Despite agreeing with his wife that he should do more useful housework, he said it would be fair for her to put more than her usual 50% into household bills.

“That way I could at least have some money to spend in the coming months,” he explains. “She disagrees and we had a (somewhat civil) argument about it. We couldn’t see eye to eye.”

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The woman looks at the bills.

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He then offered a more detailed explanation of his wife’s perspective in the discussion.

“The way she sees it: I can still pay my share of the household, so I should. And I have free time, so it is normal that I would spend more time on housework, etc. She on my pov. he looks at me as if he is paying me to do household chores in his own home, which he considers absurd.”

Meanwhile, he says he has a different way of looking at their situation.

“Yes, it makes sense that I do more housework during this period. But it makes a lot of sense for her to invest more,” he says. “I don’t think it’s fair that he expects me to spend my extra time on household chores, but he won’t support me financially.”

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Addressing his fellow Reddit users, he then asks if he’s “stupid” for thinking this way, noting that both he and his wife agreed that an “outside view” would be helpful in resolving their feud.

Most commentators agreed that the husband was “not an a-hole” and sided with his perspective.

“When one partner is unemployed, it’s natural for the other partner to temporarily take on more of the expenses,” one person wrote.

Another added: “Ask her how she would feel if she was unemployed right now. Would she like to be left with $0 each month, or would she like her partner to treat her as such and pay a little more for bills for a short time?”

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However, others looked at their marriage as a whole and offered a different perspective.

“You’re a team, you should want to do the housework so your partner has more free time after work, especially if you’re at home all day to do it,” said one user. “And she should be able to see that you’re barely getting by financially and I want to make a little more progress.”

Another commenter began by saying, “Marriage is a partnership, not a business arrangement.”

The comment continued: “Doing housework in your own home is never something you are entitled to money for as an adult. Expecting compensation for something you should already be doing as a capable adult is within your rights. Period.”

Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education