A man must provide food, shelter, utilities, transportation, pay property taxes if you own a house (so you can keep your house!), keep whatever insurance is prudent (car insurance to obey the law, home insurance unless you like living dangerously, and health insurance unless you have $1M in the bank and can self-insure, or unless the gov't is giving out free coverage of some sort), education of his children, etc.
As for food most women would want some variety of food for their children. The odd steak, smoked salmon twice a year, fresh vegetables, meat that was not chewy. If you cut out table sauces, the better cuts of meat, stick to the cheapest foods you can cut your grocery bill enormously. You can also use old newspapers to wipe your.... But food is also a pleasure and mothers get a pleasure out of seeing their families eat well. That is why they make those huge efforts at Christmas time and other holidays. My wife and her various Russian friends here in the UK will work really hard before a large gathering of Eastern Europeans to pull the stops out and produce a fantastic spread of good food. There are always some luxury items in there like smoked salmon, prawns/shrimp etc. Wherever I have travelled in the world,this love for good food is a universal constant. Anglo Saxons and Protestant countries tend to have the least love for food and see it as utilitarian. The French and Italians and Spanish and Arabs and Uzbeks and Japanese love their food. Difference cultures value different stuff. English and Americans drive flashy cars and spent money on the outside look of their homes, to other cultures these things are more utilitarian.
As for shelter most women want to raise there children in a similar or better home than they were raised. You can bring up a family of nine in a house with one toilet and bathroom. We had two toilets and one bathroom in the house I grew up in all with separate doors. There were 11 of us but it was workable with the odd argument from the girls. Our grandparents used outhouses. I have one bathroom, three shower rooms and a total of four toilets in my house.
If you are looking for a woman raised in a first world country who is happy to live and raise a family in a house that does not have an inside flushing toilet, then you are going to find that most women expect one and usually expect one toilet upstairs and one downstairs, so if they or their children need to go to the toilet at night they don't wake the whole house up. And most people want two toilets in a house that will have half a dozen or more people.
So defining "shelter" is more than just four walls and a roof for most people most of the time.
Next, take the summer vacation period. Our 6 children are off school until early September and need to occupy their day. My wife has an agenda of what they will do all day. My mother was ill when I was growing up so she was a little less focused on planning. In the mornings they might visit a park, in the afternoon play in the garden. At 4pm today I am coaching the cross country team. Also today she is dropping visitors back to London Airport. That is 50 dollars in gasoline for the airport trip alone. At some point during the summer holidays we will visit a castle and a theme park with roller-coasters and probably take them to the theatre in London, last week they all went to see a sci-Fi movie at the local movie theatre on a cheaper day. Still cost 40 dollars for the ticket. I don't consider it luxury living to do those sorts of trips to entertain children during the summer. I think it is important for children to have fun and do fun things, go on roller coasters, visit museums in a large city etc. It makes them well rounded and opens them up to new sights and sounds and builds confidence. You don't have to eat in the theme park restaurant, you can make sandwiches and drink tap water or fruit juice, as we do, but you have to pay for the 30 dollars, at least, of gas and the 80 dollars, at least, in tickets to get into the attraction.
Now sure, you can be smart and save money in other places. I just repaired my washing machine, again and I can usually make a machine that most families would throw away after 5 years last 8 years before buying a new one. I drive two cars that did not cost me what most of you spent on your own car. Since my children live in a 7 bedroom house I don't feel they need to be dropped at friends in a 30,000 dollar car when a 1500 dollar car will do the task.
Likewise they wear second hand clothes, mostly bought from ebay or given to us by other families. I don't want them to care about labels or the latest fashions. They look perfectly neat and tidy and the clothes don't appear at all worn or washed out.
Ultimately some women might care more about a new washing machine or a car than entertaining their children during the summer vacation. People spend their money as they choose. I know one Trad family with teenaged children who have never taken them to London despite it being only 90 mins away. You can see that the children are somewhat withdrawn because they've essentially grown up with just their own company and the attitude of " they have the basics and that should be enough" has prevailed through their lives.
Their parents have a nicer car than me, but only really use it to go to mass because they "cannot afford" the gasoline to go further than 20 miles from their home.
So it is a complex formula, but my attitude has always been to try and earn more money than I strictly needed and then work out what I could economise on rather than trying to make a small salary stretch beyond what was practical or desirable.
Topic: Modern Catholic men (Read 2305 times)