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Comment by notch656c | Hacker News Reader

If you have kids and quit while your family is used to the standard of living there is a good chance a divorce is in the cards.

You will then owe 20% (pretax, 30% post tax) of your "imputed" salary for the kid, as well as possible alimony. If you don't come up with 20% of your generous salary you git tossed in a cage, even if the kid only needs a tiny fraction of that for a decent life. For many it's impossible to step down their career without being tossed into prison, as the judge uses "imputed income" to calculate what you owe based on what you can potentially earn. That is if say you go from engineer to carpenter, you may now owe over 100% of your salary for support.

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Or you know, talk to your spouse about it first. I dropped down to $0 income for 2 years with two kids and a wife. My family is as strong as ever.

Obviously just one data point and divorce rates are high. Do you have any data on this specific case: depressed about job, quits job to be happier, results in divorce. It seems quiet possible that given the circumstances, quitting the job might decrease the chance of divorce by helping remove so much stress from work.

Thanks for sharing that data point. I'm planning to take 6-12 months off of work with 2 kids and a wife. I'm scared about the impact this could have on the relationship. But I've talked to my wife and she is supportive. Reading your comment reminded me that I'm doing this to feel better not just for myself but for the family.

If you're no longer going to be contributing income, what will you contribute instead to the family? Nobody respects or appreciates a freeloader as a partner. But if something other than money is contributed, it's more likely to work.

Holy God it's not like being mentally present, raising kids, or just doing chores around the house is valuable to your family. /s

Such a toxic, capitalistic, misandronistic mindset.

It’s just a realistic mindset.

If you’re a man and quit working - you’re in the fast track to being broken up with.

I don’t know why we act like gender norms don’t exist.

> I don’t know why we act like gender norms don’t exist.

They’re inconvenient, uncomfortable, and people want to pretend they don’t exist because there’s a one in a million exception.

In the real world a man who can’t provide is going to find out almost no woman will tolerate that, even if they claim otherwise.

For half the assets + 20-25% of a top engineers salary (court imposed child support) you can hire an au pair to do your bitch work for half the week and still probably have money left over to buy dinner for a fuck-boy/girl on the side. Probably can even find a new person to stay with and take advantage of dual income life while availing yourself of the 20-25% income stream of the high earner.

Economically I don't see the advantage to staying together with a high earner that quits their job. Take half, plus the 20% support (they'll have to work now because they'll be tossed in jail if they don't pay, and imputed income will be at their high professional salary), then you can find a new person who doesn't work outside the house and let them contribute their half with chores. The sooner the divorce the better as they'll have to go back to work after the judge's order. Versus just having a person who doesn't work outside the house without the 20% of an engineer salary income stream.

This all sounds really fucked up but realize over 18 years we're talking about possibly $1M+ (tax-free) on the table. People will do some crazy shit for a million dollars.

>bitch work

this doesn't seem necessary or accurate

That's exactly what I said - "if something other than money is contributed".

But not every man (or woman) does these things, and likely their spouse will be doing them as well. If I do half the child care and chores, while my wife does half the child care and chores AND earns all the money, how much is she going to like the arrangement?

I’m sorry but in this case you have a much bigger problem than “being a cog in the machine” and an “unfulfilling job”. You should never get in such a relation, or stay in one.

The stories of couples who FIRE'd together and the wife moved on from the relationship in anger/disgust 2-3 years down the road are copious...

Probably the best thing for both of them, obviously a mismatch.

I don’t understand the logic behind this. A man can lose his job then how can he make court ordered payments for kids and wife? And then putting the man behind bars is detrimental to society because a divorced man would be experience depression and likely lose his job. Punishing such a man is not good for society.

Tl;dr If you value your freedom to choose your own path don’t get married or have children.

In the US you owe child support even if you're raped. So it's not necessarily even a decision.

That's my take-away here too.

More like don't marry a psycho and maintain communication...

From watching other people’s lives this seems way easier on paper than in reality. It’s a huge risk no matter what.

There're plenty of safeguards the society has developed over a long time.

But if somebody heads for relationship straight from romance movies with drama all around and sex is #1 criteria... Then outcome is pretty clear.

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