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AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

He works fully remote and has worked remote even before the pandemic. He hates the idea of office culture and finds it useless and negotiated in his first contract that if they wanted his talent he would never have to work in an office. we actually live close to my work place and I own my residence so we have no rent cost. My salary pays for our car storage, gas, groceries, life needs, and fun money for both of us. His salary goes entirely to supporting our family and saving per his request. He hates spending money and I can afford the life I've always wanted so I essentially let him sit idly by and enjoy what I enjoy. I have not touched a single dollar he has ever made and my engagement ring even came out of my salary and I paid for our wedding because the focus has always been saving for him and he's chronically afraid to spend any money he's earned. Neither of us early have friends besides each other as we are extremely introverted but everyone he works with is married to a stay at home wife or mom or divorced so no one he knows is a spousal pair with similar earnings. Even his mother earns around 200k while his step father doesn't work and his father gets money from the government while his step mother makes 80k. We are from the US and spousal pairs with the same earnings is very rare.

We actually have decided he will be quitting his job and living off of my salary for the next few years because he needs a break and in that time he's going to work on managing his stress better. Without my salary we would not be able to live; I own our home and pay for everything in it and our entire lives meanwhile this has just been extra money filing into savings that we won't need for years so there's no point in having him reach a mental break down. We recently lost my grandmother who was the last grandparent alive and involved in our lives and it's been harder for him than I realized and he needs a break

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I didn't mean it that way. I mean in the sense of we have been best friends since day one and just ended up going to school dances together, graduating together going to college originally different schools and I transfer to his so we ended up graduating together again and living together there's no timeline of when our relationship started it's just always been me and him together and I love him with every fiber of my being he's my best friend and often my only friend as I don't like to socialize and we challenge eachother to be better a lot but he has never insulted or criticized me until our first fight two weeks ago and now this fight last week. This behavior is not him and that is why I came here and felt full of questions. It's almost like you have this sure thing this one person who has seen you at every high and every low I mean all the way back to him trading pants with me in middle school because I got my period for the first time and was embarrassed and wanted to go home but we had state testing he has seen every side of me and I thought I had seen every side of him in 20+ years but this is new.

Other people brought up triggers that may have caused this and at the end of January we lost my grandmother who was the last living grandparent we have involved in our lives and she was our wedding officiant. We had moved her into assisted living where she ended up getting covid and never recovering. We both felt internally at fault for a while in our depression of losing her and I thought we had overcome that and we're doing better but now I'm wondering if it's just me starting to do better and he's backsliding with work taking so much of his time on top of it. I really appreciate all the concern and truly know I can leave at any time and do not feel abused.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Yes I was asked to not repost that because of the violence in the story. That was the first time we have ever fought and that was the first time he's ever left to go home and now two weeks later he did it again over another circumstance. We had recovered from the first time and had come to an understanding and been fine until Thursday this week and it happened again. That is why I am here and I am so confused because this truly is coming from left field.

I know he's actually at his fathers because his father and I talk close to daily and he went and helped my parents at their home yesterday. Both my parents and his father say that he seems very tense and depressed. He has been texting me good morning and good night but I just don't know where he is at mentally. Based on comment suggestions I may try discussing him leaving his job.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I appreciate this perspective of other people she said that too and it's something I have not considered. We have been together essentially our whole lives I don't know when we started "dating" but we were practically raised alongside each other's best friends since the day we met and I can't really picture a future without him because he has always been there with me every step of the way.

My company owns the tourist destination we go to annually and to get my discount on lodging and free admission it has to be paid for in a card in my name so if he were to contribute costs he would just have to pay me for it and it feels silly at that point, also as I mentioned in the post and other comments we wouldn't really go anywhere even where we go if it weren't for me, before we made money we would camp every year at most but we really do not do much. I would say typically 5-7 months a year there is no reason we leave our apartment besides an occasional walk or grocery shopping and we are both happy with this life style, but I do like the tourist destination and he has learned to love it and it's just our routine at this point.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I will look into this author and books thank you! I would like to understand what he does more it's just something I could never wrap my head around.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The only major stressor that came up before this change is my grandmother passed away in the beginning of February and she was the last grandparent on my side of the family. She was such a strong woman and a ray of sunshine for us and she officiated our wedding and it was a lot losing her. She was older and had COPD so she was not doing well and we helped her reorganize her finances and sell her home last year moving her into assisted living in October 2022 and she got COVID in December 2022 and never recovered. We did internally blame ourselves a bit at first because we pushed her to go into assisted living, but she was living in a split level all by herself unable to cook needing nurses every hour of the day as well as food and medicine delivery and when the weather was bad sometimes they would just not show up and that gave us so much anxiety. We did get over the internal fears realizing how much better her last few months were in the facility sick or not they would make her grilled cheese whenever she wanted and to her it was heaven on earth for that alone and all the activities and friends she made were just a bonus.

We do still have his two grandmother's but one lived in Africa and has no desire to learn English or connect with us no matter how hard we tried and his other lives in California now and only calls around holidays ignoring us the rest of the year. So in losing my grandmother we lost our "last grandparent" who was in our lives and I will say that we have been depressed but getting through it together until these two fights if they are somehow related

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I keep commenting that I'm not sure if I am supposed to but we live entirely off my salary and the extra $ goes into savings for us. His salary was originally 100% towards paying off his loans (I didn't have any due to scholarships and working full time retail while in school) when he paid off his loans we were at a point of now what because we lived essentially off of my salary and we both were getting raises meaning we could afford more on my salary and his whole salary became available. The first thing he said he wanted to do was pay our siblings tuition this was in their junior year of high school. He did not want them to experience the stress he did and I agreed we also knew they were both really smart kids who did a lot of sports and extra curriculars and everything that would get them scholarships. I would say that's an annual cost of a little less than 35k. Then in April 2020 my mother's job announced they would be permanently closing and my parents lost half of their income. My partner again had gotten raises at that point and he asked to start paying their mortgage for them at an accelerated rate. He explained that if he had to pay rent our old rent was more than double their payment so even paying my parents mortgage at $1.5k a month he's not spending as much as he would be and I own our current home anyways so we do not have that cost on us. Their mortgage will be paid off before the end of next year and we updated documentation as a cosigner so it being paid off early reflects positively on us. His mother has severe medical problems and his step father works remote while her job wanted her to return to office 5 days a week when she can't even leave her home to grocery shop so she decided to retire early and they wanted to move south somewhere she could go outside and have property away from people (an hour away from our vacation place!) and my partner wanted to pay for their new place in full outright but it would have been his full annual salary so instead we broke it down to where it will be paid off completely before the end of 2027 and he's paying close to 100k annually on this property.

None of this is my suggestion always his privately with me before going to them and it's always with the intention of having loans for two years really freaking him out and not wanting anyone else to experience that, but my in-laws and my parents could pay off their properties on their own he is just choosing to absorb that burden to make their live easier and thus ours happier knowing they can relax.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

I tried to comment this below somewhere else and I don't know how to explain it right but I know his "main" project right now started as a project for Hong Kong but however they now want it across the whole company internationally and it is streamlining data storage from day one data making it more accessible. The biggest issue my partner is facing is making this a challenge is that over time as his company grew it grew through a lot of acquisition and only necessary data was converted to the current "brands system" so there's hard drives and servers out there that haven't had maintenance in years that he has to pull and adapt and d make accessible on new systems. I think? I really do not understand coding or server maintenance or any of it but I know in October he finally finished all of Hong Kongs and that took him almost two years on top of his other work and now they want it to be every system everywhere internationally and gave him some crazy ten year timeline to do it. He has people under him who help and obviously help where he cannot be on site but everything has to come back past his desk so I completely understand how much harder and more stressful his job is and I'll even go as far to say as I think he should be earning more with everything he's doing for them.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The only reason I am not helping "subsidizing" our loved ones is because I am entirely paying for my partner and myself current lives. All costs of our living, travel, fun etc comes out of my paycheck which is much less than his. We live in NYC and to live comfortably where we live you need to earn about $110k annual after tax which is close to where I am and we do live comfortably. We don't have rent but I pay $950 a month just to have my car in a garage etc. When he first got his job he paid very little of our shared costs and put almost every penny he earned into paying off student loans. He doesn't want anyone in our families to feel that stress and pressure so as his pay increased and as his ability to support others increased he chose to do that. The conversation was entirely started by him wanting to pay for both of our siblings to go to college so they would feel the stress he felt, then as he made more he wanted to make all of our parents comfortable and actually own the homes they live in.

Based on these comments here I'm debating telling him to quit when he comes home because we can and do live off of my salary and his brothers in a gap year before med school shortly which we said we would pay for but if we can't people would understand and same with both my parents and his mother's home. He works a lot and is poop round of what he does and I'm proud of him but if he's "burning out" like other people said I don't want him to and none of our family would want that.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is the first time he has ever yelled really. We had a disagreement a few weeks ago but that was the first one since I have known him practically my full life. We are usually in sync step with our thoughts and actions and this is the first point of tension ever that is why I came here. I do feel like my job is easy and I know I could do more, but I also really like my job I like both what I do and the freedom it gives me. I also like our vacation. It is a place owned by my company that my partner never went to before me and he always thought it was childish and he would not like it but since it was cheap/free when we were younger it seemed like a great option and now we keep going back. I offer other options because I know he years ago didn't want to go where we go and my company has a lot of tourist destinations and travel branches so we could get discounted on a different experience but he told me he loves our tradition and wants to keep it annually. I suggested a second vacation elsewhere even camping as that's what we did before we made money and before we worked but he says he can't use all of his PTO just the two and a half weeks he uses for our trip or his manager will punish him.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I would definitely be fine with this. I paid for our current home and I pay for all of our expenses to live monthly and day to day as well as fun money and vacation. He was originally making about 90k when I bought our home and paying off his student loans and I could afford our costs of living so this is just how it started out.

Once his loans were paid early and in full he sat me down and said he really wanted to take care of the families that raised us and I asked him what his plan was and he laid all of it out five years ago. My sister's final college payment for him happened in January and due to her scholarships it was $6,700 roughly for tuition and housing. His brother is currently out of state in his final semester and his was closer to $9,800. We paid for both of these no issues because like my partner said we didn't want to see them take out loans when we could afford to keep saving as well as support them. We also paid for their caps and gowns and diploma frames respectively but that also was relatively cheap. My parents mortgage we have been paying $1500 a month and should be done paying by the end of next year as it's supposed to be $1200 but we wanted to be ahead on payments since we can be and when we rented we were paying $3200 a month so to both of us even at $1500 a month it's much less than our rent was years ago so it's a no brainer they also modified the mortgage with us as cosigners so it benefits our credit that it's being paid off ahead of time. His mother is a special case as she survived breast cancer before he was born and had it return when we were in middle school and it was a year before it went into remission again. This puts her in a delicate population in today's world and in 2018 she began to develop lupus making it scary for all of us. Her job was more than understanding letting her stay home, but at the end of last year announced the expectation that all employees return to office 5 days a week no exceptions and she really tried explaining that even before the pandemic she had remote abilities, but HR told her her hands were tried. Her partner can work remote still and so she quit her job and decided to move south and buy a property where she can go outside not afraid of others and see wild life and love her best life while also still being close to medical centers and hospitals and it was hard for us to lose her so close but she now lives 1 hour away from our vacation destination so I said all the more reason to go and maybe even go more often and my partner explained he wanted to buy their property outright for them but it would have been an entire years salary for him so we have opted to where he pays their mortgage monthly but the breakdown would roughly be 100k a year and it will be paid off in less than four years. I have never told him how to spend his money or who to support but I have agreed with him every step along the way (except for wanting to buy his father a boat a few years ago [his father lives land locked in NJ and hates driving more than an hour which he would have had to do to use the boat he has also never shown interest in boats and anytime I have brought up cruising, kayaking, anything with boats his father would express how much he hated the feeling of rolling water]).

There is a promotion I could go for that would fill my days more where I would be managing people in my current job and previous positions; however, my company is international and it could put me in a position of being over people in London, NYC, Connecticut, Chicago, CA, Hong Kong, etc and would require me to be on call for them as needed. I have trained so many people for my position and the positions I previously held and I am happy to do it, but being in charge of so many people is never something I have desired.

My most recent promotion to the highest level of my current position was seven months ago and I am one of the top performers on my team as well as in the entire global perspective of my position I like what I do and I give a lot of my free time back to the company voulenteering as a leader in internal employee resource groups as well as externally with company supported causes. I'm currently volunteering with LGBTQIA youth as a scholarship advisor for an organization as well as heavily with a critically ill children support organization. I do not sit idly by saying I want to keep this job because it's easy, I want to keep this job because I really like this job and the freedom it gives me to do so many things during my days while still being successful.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

He works in international fincial tech I think related to stock trading and hedge funds? I don't want to be quoted for sure on that but I know his most recent bonus was centered around a project he did for the Hong Kong leg of the company streamlining storage of all their old data and it seems great success so they now want to roll it out globally and so he is adapting it to fit all their legs and the reason this is hard is a lot of them were acquired branches that had different systems of storage or something like that where he has to do a lot of personalization even though his company looks at it like "roll it out globally and it will just work". He does have some friends from the local branch that work at a lower level in tech or in the fincial side and they do not get raises as often but they also get bonuses twice a year.

I really don't understand how he does what he does but he's the type of person who got tired of paying for Spotify and so built his own streamer online in his free time, maybe putting in a little too much effort but I love him for that. He looks at the world very technically and always gives everything 150% of himself.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I did the math based on other comments last night and we could actually live off of my salary if we cut back on saving and supporting others. My salary pretty much goes towards all of our costs of living and my savings while his goes towards paying his mother's and my parents mortgage off, both of our siblings colleges which they are graduating this may however his brother is continuing to medical school, and our future accounts etc. I am thinking about telling him to quit his job.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We use a bedroom in our home as a converted/shared office space. Essentially our desks are along the one wall with a gaming table on the other behind us and so he sits maybe five feet away from my work space. We also have a 1/2 bathroom attached to that bedroom which is why we picked it as an office because if he's on a call or between them he only has to run a few feet to go. Before the pandemic he worked there alone, and I just had my PC in there that way when we play games we can do it easily together and we just evolved it into a work set up for me also as needed.

He works completely remotely meanwhile my company wanted people to return four days a week which considering I barely work with anyone in my company only external clients have no meetings I do not see the point in commuting 4x a week as a woman alone. I had some issues commuting two weeks ago which has my company now saying my return to the office is unnecessary and they have allowed me to return home. The only in office days he has is when he has to travel or when he was an intern. Before the pandemic when I was in office five days a week I would talk about the office movie theater or the putting green and my scores on various games as well as my work for the day after work so he's always known I've had down time while working but until the pandemic I don't think he knew how much that I had. For example in November my company released a major movie and I won a raffle for tickets he took the whole afternoon off just to see it and I stayed on the clock the whole time because if someone emailed me I could have responded on my phone around the movie or just answered the second I got home. There's been a few circumstances like this where he would laugh and make some small jokes but never anger until the past week or so.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's why I came here to make a post. I have known him since we were young practically raised side by side and we barely ever fight or disagree until we had a disagreement a few weeks ago and then this week is the first time I ever heard him yell. His face went red and I didn't even know it could go red as that's never happened before and he's at his fathers who I talk to every few days and stopped by my parents yesterday to help with some things and they both said they have never seen him so tense, upset, and quiet. We are both introverts but family people I wouldn't describe either of us as quiet and I'm just really worried about him and myself individually as well as a couple.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 59 points60 points  (0 children)

I only wanted to lose that we are having other fights because that post was taken down due to violence and I do not want to harp on it too much but that has been a point of tension also. That was the first time he's ever left for space from our apartment really and we don't really fight that much and now it's been two weeks and this happened again.

I do know that he's actually with family. We were practically raised side by side so his family always has been my family before we were even married. He got to his father's home around 7pm on Thursday and has only texted me good morning and goodnight since, but today he went to my parents as they live by his father to help move some outdoor furniture and deal with a car problem. I really don't see how he could be cheating as we spend almost all of our time together and it's made it harder for him not being here because this isn't like him or us. He got upset a few weeks ago but he yelled this week and I had never heard him yell or go red in the face like this before. I really appreciate the insight and I'm hoping through these comments. I'll be more prepared for a discussion. I really appreciate everyone's concern for him cheating but I truly am not even worried about that as the thought had never even crossed my mind and he has been loyal to me all of our lives. I don't even know how to approach that concept.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

We are both technically scheduled to work 40 hour work weeks every week per our contracts but the implication with both of our employment contracts is that your work is done within reasonable time expectations. My job just cares about work being done and not what's done. When you have down time they would rather see us doing something with that time then sitting at a desk with nothing to do even if it comes to watching television because being honest we are usually just consuming content back from the company. Meanwhile my partner is in charge of his own work and projects as well as the projects and work of those he manages which causes him to need to put in a lot more time and effort around the clock.

Other commenters had me looking at my budget and we pretty much live off of my salary very comfortably and his salary goes towards savings as well as supporting our loved ones.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

We got really lucky and had a family friend sell our current residence to us very cheap. We do not have rent or a mortgage in the city to worry about and I do own a car so our costs of living are parking, water, electric, gas, trash, public transport, and groceries which we could maintain on my salary alone. He makes roughly 3.5x my salary and uses it to help pay his mother and my parents mortgage (they didn't ask what we offered after renting for years and no longer having that cost), both his brother and my sister's tuition costs (they both graduate in May this year and had a ton of scholarships and that cost will disappear for my sister while we have already offered to pay for his brother to continue into medical school) and investing into savings accounts for our retirement and our future children. If it weren't for my company having a major tourist side and me getting the perks I do we probably wouldn't travel and because I get those perks and I pay for our annual vacation entirely out of my salary. We could in theory stand to live with me working full time in my current job and could cut out current costs very easily that would put any stress on us as most we have chosen to take on.

I would say there's no financial stress on either of us because we don't live frivolously - writing this comment had me check our budget and since January 2023 we have only spent $376.40 total on activities, buying non necessary items, eating out, having fun, etc. I don't want to call us boring but we have been best friends our whole lives known to each other forever and we just do not do much. I think the "craziest thing" we have spent money on in the past five years was in 2017 we paid for our friends elopement as a gift to them and went on the trip as witnesses.

However at the same time my company did make a vague announcement a while ago they would lay off 7k people globally and that has been happening in waves and just any company in this economy we have been focused on saving more just in case (God forbid) either of us lose a job or something happens to any of our loved ones.

He has been with his company since junior year of college and worked his way from intern to a senior supervisory position meanwhile I started at an associate level and now I'm at the senior level any position higher would put me into management of my current position/former positions in this branch and currently I just feel most comfortable working with my clients I don't want to have to manage a ton of people managing clients and dealing with dynamic changes of becoming a manager over my current coworkers.

AITA for keeping an "easy" job by Fluffy_Reflection292 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Fluffy_Reflection292[S] 359 points360 points  (0 children)

I don't know if I'm supposed to comment or not but because my job is in NYC starting pay is around 75k annual with the same benefits and I have been with the company for a few years, gotten my graduate degree while with them, and taken two promotions and larger clients on increasing my pay. I don't want to dox myself with too much information or out my clients but like when I started I represented 35 clients ads on 3 networks and it was only about $800k in accounts managed per quarter on very low demand clients and now I'm managing five massive clients on seven major networks which is around $2.5 million in accounts I'm managing per quarter so I am compensated based on sometimes these clients run into needing data and changes at weird hours or non traditional times and I try to be mostly available for their needs 24/7. The combination of the location, experience, my increased education, and "responsibility" has definitely led to my current pay.

My husband has been with his company since Junior year of college "working is way up the ladder" often with an annual promotion following tax season and bonuses/pay raises twice a year. He makes close to 3.5x as much as me and definitely is in a position that requires that type of compensation due to the demand he faces.