Is it wrong to feel emasculated because my girlfriend just got her salary offer, and it is almost 50% more than what I make now? I'm feeling very, very inadequate.
While I understand the masculine impulse to be the provider, having been a poor graduate student the past couple of years has more or less forced me to get over it. My current partner makes, quite literally, four times what I make in a given year. My monthly paycheck is what ze makes in a week. Ze buys me metrocards, drinks in bars, etc, and only expects I do the laundry in return (well, basically, the financials are more complicated than that). Instead, it might be helpful to focus on the context instead of the roles of the relationship. I don't know the context, so I'm probably not helpful, but if she's in a higher paying industry, or has more "job-skills" or more experience or a higher degree, or even just a degree from a "higher prestige" college. There are somethings that are fair (more experience, higher degree) and some that are unfair (which college if same degree, different industry/profession), but either way, none relate back to your gender or hers or your particular configuration of gender within the relationship. Our income differentials relate back to the fact that I'm in graduate school and Zach has a real job. Were Zach to just continue working (ze's also a paralegal, btw, though at Legal Aid), I would eventually get a much higher paying job than hir, but Zach is going to law school next year, so there goes any chance I had at a higher paying job! Academia is typically much lower pay than lawyering. So will I ever have the higher income? No. But I will have much more flexability in my schedule, which I look forward to once I have kids.
Instead, it might be helpful to focus on the context instead of the roles of the relationship. I don't know the context, so I'm probably not helpful, but if she's in a higher paying industry, or has more "job-skills" or more experience or a higher degree, or even just a degree from a "higher prestige" college. There are somethings that are fair (more experience, higher degree) and some that are unfair (which college if same degree, different industry/profession), but either way, none relate back to your gender or hers or your particular configuration of gender within the relationship. Our income differentials relate back to the fact that I'm in graduate school and Zach has a real job. Were Zach to just continue working (ze's also a paralegal, btw, though at Legal Aid), I would eventually get a much higher paying job than hir, but Zach is going to law school next year, so there goes any chance I had at a higher paying job! Academia is typically much lower pay than lawyering. So will I ever have the higher income? No. But I will have much more flexability in my schedule, which I look forward to once I have kids.
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