Vacation With Your Signifcant Other: Who Pays for What?
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What vacation money questions are introduced at the episode start?
Here's your Money Briefing. I'm J.R. Whalen at The Wall Street Journal in New York. It's family vacation season, but what if you're vacationing with a friend or significant other? Who pays for what? And what if not everyone makes the same salary? We'll explore those questions in a moment. First, some money and market news you should know. The average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage inched up this week to 3.75%. That was up two basis points. And halfway through 2019, the 30-year mortgage has only risen eight times. Also, this summer, borrowers taking out mortgages backed by the Veterans Administration have will be paying higher fees. That's the result of legislation signed by President Trump in May that extends $3.4 billion in medical benefits to veterans who served in the Navy off the coast of Vietnam and say they were exposed to Agent Orange.
The higher mortgage fees will help pay for those benefits. An Andrew Trump administration rule takes effect Friday that prohibits states from automatically collecting dues from home care workers' paychecks. About eight states currently allow the unionization of people who provide in-home care to the disabled and elderly and whose pay is subsidized by the government. The Service Employees International Union, an American federation of state, county, and municipal employees, represent the vast majority of unionized home care workers. The administration announced its plan in May to undo a 2014 rule that permitted the collection of dues through automatic payroll deductions from workers paid through Medicaid.
Conservative groups have long argued that home care workers are often coerced into joining unions.
Let's talk about vacations.
What current money and market headlines set the context before the interview?
This isn't, though, about where to find the most exciting getaway package or setting up tour groups. It's about who pays, specifically younger couples planning a trip with a friend or significant other. It can get more thorny than you think.
Why is who pays on vacation a special issue for younger couples?
Wall Street Journal reporter Kevin McAllister writes the Young Money column, and he's written about the delicate process of sorting out who pays for what. So, Kevin, for those who are married or have combined their finances, this might not be an issue. But for younger couples, you're probably not drawing from one source to pay for things.
Yeah, that's correct. And you might not even have saved together. You may have saved independently, which adds a whole new level of complexity to the actual equation.
And in your case, the who pays for what question started based on how you and your girlfriend were planning to get to your vacation spot.
You know, one of the things that we came across was a situational inequality that wasn't just brought about by, you know, the number of zeros on our paycheck, but was brought about by the implied benefits that the specific location to which we were going had. So this was brought about by me actually getting the opportunity to stay for a couple days at her parents' house in a location that she would already be. And so...
So she didn't have to fly anywhere to get to where you're going.
Exactly.
How did Kevin McAllister describe situational inequalities affecting travel costs?
And so it made the costs that we were going to incur on this vacation a little bit different. And we were trying to figure out exactly how to split things up when there's a situation that that works out like that, where, you know, what one person has to pay just straight up might not be the same as what their their partner has to pay.
It might seem as simple as just split all the costs down the middle, but when you're dealing with people who are more junior in their career, I guess that these kind of money issues tend to pop up.
Yeah, exactly. And I think that what it comes down to is trying to balance the two factors and try to make sure that both people that are involved and actually going are able to kind of find the midpoint and the balancing point between feeling indebted to one another or feeling like there's some big sacrifice. And Especially when finances are separate, that's a tricky balance to strike sometimes because both of those things have the opportunity to ruin an afternoon, let alone a week-long trip or a two-week-long trip or however long you want to embark on your trip for.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What vacation money questions are introduced at the episode start?
0:05–1:55
2
What current money and market headlines set the context before the interview?
1:55–2:08
3
Why is who pays on vacation a special issue for younger couples?
2:08–3:17
4
How did Kevin McAllister describe situational inequalities affecting travel costs?
3:17–7:41
5
What practical ways do couples handle income disparities when splitting trip costs?
7:41–8:38
6
How do differing levels of interest in a trip affect who pays more?
8:38–8:43
Speakers
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