Talking about money emerged as a key preventive factor in the stories of 12 Anglo-Celtic and Indian women in Australia who had survived economic abuse.
It can be awkward to talk of money and relationships. It can reveal financial dependency when you want to see togetherness. The key is to speak of money with ‘unconditional mutual regard.’ If you are hoping for partnership in your relationship, it is a red flag if you cannot speak of money.
The women in these stories had professional or graduate education. Ten of the 12 were in paid work before marriage. Six of the 12 women were the main earners in their marital households. Most of the 12 women had supportive parents and/or siblings close by or across borders. These women did not lack financial literacy or capability.
These factors helped them survive economic abuse but did not prevent it.
These women managed money through joint accounts and separate accounts. Some believed in the jointness of money in marriage while others were comfortable with the male control of money. Yet both sets of women found their husbands used money to control the women’s lives, entrap and isolate them, and made them feel this was happening to them because it was their fault.
What these women had in common was that none of them learned from their parents how to speak of money in intimate relationships with ‘unconditional mutual regard’.
Most did not talk of money with their future partners, assuming they had shared values. One of the 12 women tried, but later found she had not been heard.
The women also did not negotiate the changing balance of ‘our money,’ ‘my money’, and ‘your money’ as needs changed with life stages, such as having children, unemployment, or retirement.
Enid (not her real name), 57, working in consumer finance, reflected on money and relationships after suffering economic abuse in her first marriage and a subsequent relationship.
She said ‘I remember one day … I made a conscious decision that … I didn’t need to be a victim. I didn’t need to be subservient’ in order to have a relationship.
She did get married a second time. She says ‘My marriage this time is different…I had to learn that this person was very happy to share on an equal basis.’
They have continued to talk about money as life stages changed. When they got married, both earned. But as they got older, he no longer worked at a job. He worked on their land to grow fruits and vegetables for the house. She now was the sole earner.
They discussed how much they needed for expenses, how much they wanted for their continuing obligations towards their adult children.
They made sure she kept some money for herself – something she had not done in her previous relationships. An agreed amount was deposited into his account every week.
She said ‘If he needs more, we also have a joint account. We talk about it.’
Enid’s story of money in marriage had changed. But when her daughter had difficulties with money after she had a child, Enid realised she had not spoken openly about money to her children as they were growing up.
Enid’s daughter and her husband were both earning when they got married. She had never had to ask her husband for money. They shared expenses.
Then they had a child and Enid’s daughter stopped paid work to look after the child.
For the first time she found she had no money for herself and the home. She did not know how to ask for money. Her husband had never been asked to provide.
Enid’s daughter and son-in-law had not talked about how having a child was going to affect the balance of ‘my money’, ‘our money’ and ‘your money’.
Enid had managed money well but had not spoken to the children how she did or did not negotiate money in her relationships.
When her children were growing up, it was Enid’s behaviour that remained their template for money in marriage.
Enid was surprised one of the things her daughter had learned was not to express her own needs in terms of money. She was only now learning from her mother how to speak of money with her husband with a sense of ‘unconditional mutual regard’.
Supriya Singh is an Honorary Professor at the Graduate School of Business and Law. Her research expertise is in the sociology of money and banking, globalization and money, user-centered design of technologies, and qualitative research methodology.
