Should my husband get a "real job"?

Question

What do to about my husband and his businesses?
I'm not quite sure what to do about my husband. I may be overreacting, but want an outsider's perspective. We've been married for 4 1/2 years. When we got married he had a dead-end job that paid well. Two weeks after the wedding he quit his job, and we moved back home, where we're from. He started his own business and I was very supportive. His business isn't great but he's not doing too bad. He makes about 12k a year, but only contributes about 2k a year to our checkbook, the rest goes for business expenses. Last year he started another business with the friend. It went ok and they made quite a bit of money until the friend embezzled most of it. This year my husband and his brother started yet another business, and they haven't made a dime. I pay all the bills in the house and do all of the housework, except for his laundry.

Am I out of line for wanting him to get a real job?

Answer 1

Nope. I too was married for 4 years - all four of which I worked a full time job and he worked "his business" at home - which brought in little money and he only actually worked about 2-3 hours a day. The house was a mess and falling apart and I had to support us. I resented him for it. I hated the fact that he expected me to get a second job to make ends meet, and the fact that he ecpected me to cook and do the dishes when he was home all day watching star trek and eating cereal - do I still sound hostile?! I am - at myself for wasting 4 years before I finally divorced him! I don't care about bringing in a lot of money - I don't care about prestige or career goals - I think that a spouse needs to be able to pull their weight in the relationship and if that means working full time or staying home and keeping the house and the kids - fine - but neither party should be taken advantage of!

Answer 2

That's a really hard question. It usually takes 3 to 5 years for a business to become profitable, so if he's making money and the business is growing and there's potential for it to continue growing and he likes what he's doing and you have the ability to support the household while his business is young, then I'd support his ambitions. If the business is as dead-end as his job was, if he's not putting any real effort into it, if he will NEVER contribute more than $2000 per year to the household, and if you can't make sufficient income to keep you out of the poorhouse, then you would be well within your rights to ask him to share the responsibilities for bringing in enough money to make it. If you're just mad because you do all the housework, don't make it about his job, make it about that.

Answer 3

For me that is not enough of a logical argument to prove something exists. It proves it could exist though. But it is not definitive proof. Here are my personal two main points for believing in Christianity. 1) The odds of: the galaxy having the perfect physical constants, that the sun is perfectly situated and made to support life giving planets, that the planet earth is perfectly situated and made to support life, that life could randomly evolve even when random complex order defies the laws of entropy. All of these odds combined together are incredibly worse odds of there being even one pair of identical snowflakes ever. And I think that most people will agree that having two identical snowflakes is just against all odds, even with all the snowflakes made, that it never happened, or will happen. And yet people believe that something infinity more complex just happened? I guess if you eliminate some sort of intervention, this is the only explanation left. But for me the odds are too great. Something had a hand in creating the universe and life itself. This leads me to my second point, which religion is right. I will go with a religion that had a real historical figure. And since something miraculous happened with the creating of the universe, then I will look for miraculous acts. But there are legends about historical figures doing miraculous things, which history says aren't true. In the case of Alexander the great, his mythical deeds were ascribed to him hundreds of years after his lifetime. The same thing applies for Mohamed. The New Testament was written in a very hostile environment, with living eyewitness still around to confirm the miraculous claims. Basically, Christianity wouldn't have formed, not in that environment, not if the claims it made were not true. And that is why I remain a Christian. (Yes I was a Christian before this, but I always felt there was something lacking in the explanation, then I came across these facts and I am convinced they are correct)

Answer 4

I don't think your out of line wanting a more steady income. It sounds as if a business or 2 did go ok, so he's at least trying.

You need to sit and talk about this to him. Tell him his 2k isn't bringing much at all to the table.
As for home chores, tell him it's time he did most of it, sense you happen to be the bread winner now, you need more time to yourself to relax after a hard day. ( this may give him the insentive to either try harder or see you have been doing it all).

Your not out of line. Just talk to him.

Answer 5

Nope, you're not out of line. It's time he got a real job, took some responsibility for household expenses. If he can save money and use that as working capital in a few years, fine. My ex pulled this crap, and it never ended. Found out his so-called business was a financial disaster and it took years to dig out.

Answer 6

you are not out of line. He needs to think of his family first. if nothing else get a part time job to help out with the bills you cant do it alone and be happy you need to tell him to get a real paying job and contribute to the house or you will have to take the next step. you may not have a next step but he don't know that.

Answer 7

I think after 3 failed business attempts, it is obvious that he is not a owner type but a employee type. You are not out of line. draw the line and tell him if he wants to still be self employed, then it has to be after he gets home from a full time job.

Answer 8

You're absolutely not out of line for wanting him to get a real job. A marriage takes two, and you're the only one putting into it financially it sounds like.

Answer 9

Chinese said : "Behind every successful man was a woman."
This is really a hard question. Of course you want to be supportive to your husband, but yet you need to face the reality of life. Well, the choice is your. If you believe he will be successful one day, then you may want to be continues supportive for his business.

Answer 10

This is an easy one. Tell him the household expenses are X amount of dollars, and this half honey is ALL YOURS... have fun.
Then don't freakin' pay them. As soon as he realizes you're serious, or when they come repo the car, whichever comes first, he'll start making serious money again.

He doesn't have to achieve the way things are set up now. You're letting him live off of you. Stop letting him.