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Matt Lauer: Dr. Gail Saltz is a psychiatrist and / Today contributor and Money Magazine's Jean Chatzky is Today's financial editor. Ladies, good morning to both of you.
Both: Good morning, Matt.
Matt Lauer: So you, you look at this statistics, you say, Ok, 25 percent of marriages right now, the woman earn, earns more than the man. Great for women, great strides. But if you also look at the fact that in those marriages the divorce rate is higher than in marriages where the man makes more, you realize you have a problem here.
Jean Chatzky: You absolutely have a problem. It's making people on both sides of the equation uncomfortable, women just as much as men.
Matt Lauer: Men are uncomfortable because cut to the chase, money is power.
Gail Saltz: Money is power and money, and power is masculinity. This has so much to do with what your view of it means to be masculine and feminine. It for both, it's very important for both because if you don't feel like your man as masculine, right? Then what does that say about your femininity?
Matt Lauer: OK, just wait a second, we understand why the men get freaked out. Just, coz' they've been taught to say I am the provider (Right! ) I am the protector. But why exactly then are the women also (It's guilt.) uneasy with this guilt?
Jean Chatzky: It's guilt, it's guilt for leaving the household, going out, out-earning your spouse, depriving him of that masculinity.
Gail Saltz: I think it's that exactly that. Depriving him of that... it's, it's imagined women could get to, what am I really guilty about. They think they are robbing their husband/ of his masculinity.
Matt Lauer: And at some point, don't they start to question whether their husband's really trying as hard as he should be, and, and is he a slacker in some cases?
Gail Saltz: I think that's defensively somewhat to relieve their guilt. Well maybe he's been a slacker, it's not me robbing him a bit. But of course there is a wish to have an equal partner and feel provided for too on the part of the woman.
Matt Lauer: Let me get to some of the tips that you both come up with for how to make this work in an inner relationship. Think outside the box and I think what, what you mean there is redefine what it means to the terms: masculine and feminine.
Gail Saltz: Very much so. It's that and it's also come look for other ways to make each other feel masculine and feminine. So it doesn't have to be only about money, being power. There is time commitment, there is organization, there is nurturing. What else do you provide in ways you can make each other feel those masculine and feminine roles.
Matt Lauer: Control, contribute something else a value to the relationship.
Gail Saltz: Exactly.
Jean Chatzky: That's right.
Matt Lauer: Don't feel guilty. That's the other one.
Jean Chatzky: Well, and it's what that guilt makes you do, that's the problem. We've seen with women who out-earn their spouses, they come home and they take on a vast majority of the household chores which causes much more stress in the relationship and they hand their paychecks over , there is a new book out that shows women who out-earn their spouse just give the money to the guys and let them manage. That's no good for anybody.
Matt Lauer: So that they can have something that makes them feel masculine again. They, they are running the household finance, so even if they are not bringing in tho(se), that money.
Jean Chatzky: Right.
Gail Saltz: That's true. And that, and that might not be a bad thing to say . You could manage as long as the woman still knows where the money is and she has access to the money.
Matt Lauer: And by the way, you very rarely hear women who make a lot of money talking about the fact they make a lot of money. You hear men talking about that all the time. They avoid the subject, women?
Jean Chatzky: Right! We heard in the tape that women talking about the fact that she actually hides this. This, this couple goes out to dinner. She lets him pay the checks so he feels better.
Gail Saltz: You know, Matt, what matters so much is the roles of your family-of-origin. So a woman might not feel comfortable talking about the money she's making if her mother never would have done that and that wasn't the dynamic at home.
Matt Lauer: By the way, this subject gets very complicated when the wife becomes pregnant. And the baby arrives, now what about the maternity leave. If the wife is the, is the primary breadwinner, how comfortable is she gonna be even considering being a stay-at-home mom?
Jean Chatzky: Right and because you have to run the numbers in advance and you have to really explore the options. And we are not talking about the good point of this which is that this gives the family overall some additional flexibility (Options. ) to figure out who should be working out which point and if your lines of communication/ are open, then you can really use these to your advantage.
Matt Lauer: But again, more of these marriages end in divorce than traditional types of marriages, so there are clearly some issues to be dealt with. Gail and Jean, thanks very much.
Jean Chatzky: Sure.
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