WIVES AND MONEY MATTERS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXII, Issue XVI, 22 April 1899, Page 522

WIVES AND MONEY MATTERS.

Money matters are too often ‘a bone of contention' lietween husband and wife, writes Miss Frances Evans. This state of affairs is brought about more through mutual misunderstanding than by intention on the part of either.

The truth seems to be that even now. when women are to the front in business and public affairs, they know ns little about finance, domestic or national, as men do about nursing babies.

The men are largely to blame for the prevailing ignorance of the other sex about important money matters. They take it for granted, in a truly masculine way, that a woman knows nothing of such subjects.

‘My wife has no business sense.' many a man says, ‘and T don't want her to have either. When I get home from a long day in business 1 want conversation on other topics. My brain is tired. I want to be entertained.’

Very well, sir! But this is shirking; it is relegating your wife, to the place the variety theatre occupies in your mind as a means of diversion, of distressing your thoughts from business. You say, ‘She knows nothing of business’ with some contempt, while all the time you are discouraging any improvement of her mind on that subject by ignoring its importance to women’s understanding. Suppose you were to die and leave her with children and property to manage. Walking in bog or quagmire would be an easy affair compared to the poor wife’s struggle through the bewildering business consequent upon her lonely and ignorant condition as a widow. The man who is reasonable and conscientious regarding this subject, begins when he is first married by giving his wife an allowance, thus permitting her to learn the value of money as applied to domestic economy. She will learn even more through her mistakes than by what he explains to her. but both ways to knowledge are valuable.

A large proportion of the men with whom 1 have discussed this subject say, ‘That’s all right in theory, but it is not practical. For instance, I am in business for myself. My income varies from month to month. It is much easier for me to run bills and settle them quarterly from my bank account than to give my wife an allowance. She would waste more than we would gain by systematising as you suggest.’ This statement seems to me too irrational to oppose, but for the sake of my readers, whom T would help if possible, let me suggest to young men newly-married that if they have a bank account large enough to pay bills quarterly they' have enough money deposited to give a monthly’ allowance to the wife, with the understanding' that she must pay as she goes and so learn to manage with exactly what they’ can afford to live upon, and not be tempted by the opportunity to charge recklessly’ what she would never buy were the articles to be paid for in cash from her allowance. As money comes in it may be deposited, to be drawn from systematically as easily’ as unsystematically; and, after all, the question is not which plan is easiest, but it is rather what is lest in the long run—a financial policy of expediency’. If the young wife is unaccustomed to an allowance, and so does waste money at first, she will learn prudence after presenting an unbalanced account a few times.