I saw a cartoon awhile back with a pie chart depicting a man’s brain. About 20 percent of the brain was taken up with thoughts of work, another 20 percent went to sports. There was a small sliver for his car, and another for “miscellaneous,” leaving fully 60 percent to be preoccupied (that’s the only word for it!) with sex.

It would be hard to render a similar graph for a woman. For one thing, women are notorious for multitasking, which is to say, we are able to think (and do) many things at once. Add up all the things we think about and attend to in a given day, and you get off-the-chart, superwoman numbers of 150 percent or more.

At the same time, women—like men—are often accused of having one-track minds. If men are guilty of thinking non-stop about sex, our default setting would have to be relationships, or if we are currently in one, THE Relationship.

When Love and Money Collide

Perhaps this is why the intersection of love and money so often causes confusion and turmoil. When we’re quarreling about finances with our sweetie, there is often a subtext to our spat. He may be yelling about the overdrawn bank account—or perhaps you are doing the yelling—but in either case, you are probably thinking that he doesn’t care about your feelings. In short, to a woman’s way of thinking, money troubles spell relationship troubles.

From here, it’s but a short step to identifying money with love. Having plenty of the first means having enough of the second. It is my firm conviction that “bag lady” fears, prevalent even among affluent women, are less about the possibility of running out of money than running out of love. What scares us most is that those shuffling, shapeless bag ladies are always alone.

From Being an Asset, to Owning Them

Throughout most of history, females had to rely on males for economic survival. Women were responsible for preparing the meals and keeping the house, while men were responsible for providing those things in the first place. Not all that long ago, women could not own major material assets. In fact, they were themselves assets—deeded to men via marriage, along with a few cows or linens thrown in for good measure.

Our economic environment has changed profoundly in the last 40 years. Out of desire or necessity, women have left the household cave to club a few bison of their own. According to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center, approximately 22% of women now out-earn their spouses, up from 4% in 1970.

This economic upheaval—or progress, depending on your point of view—has further complicated the intersection between love and money. Now that we have jobs and minds of our own, should our money be separate, too? What happens if he’s good at managing the money, while we prefer to do something else? What about those lingering, comfy feelings we get when someone takes care of us?

Our responses to these questions can run the psychological gamut, from financial codependence at one extreme to complete financial separation at the other. From my perspective as a financial planner, here is what these states often look like:

Financial Codependence

Sometimes women clients tell me that they get along just fine with their significant others when it comes to money. However, a bit of probing often reveals that they have ceded all financial control to their partners. He not only handles the money, but does all the thinking about it, too. She calls this reliance “trust,” which is fine—until it isn’t. A divorce, separation, or death can leave her financially and emotionally unmoored, not knowing where to turn or what to do.

Signs of unhealthy financial codependence can include:

• Not knowing how your assets are titled
• Having a vague notion of your financial net worth, based primarily on what your partner tells you
• Spending only as long on your joint tax return as it takes you to sign your name
• Asking your partner to choose a financial advisor and then begging off some of the meetings with that advisor.

Financial Independence

If a woman is working full-time, she likely has achieved some financial independence, even if every bit of her salary goes to joint household accounts. This is because the benefits she acquires in the workplace—retirement plans, disability coverage, life insurance—will always be in her name only. They cannot be titled with another individual. In the case of retirement plans, however, she may not have complete discretion about her choice of beneficiary; most non-IRA retirement plans require that a spouse be named as beneficiary, unless the spouse waives this right in writing.

A woman who has acquired assets before marriage may reasonably choose to keep those resources separate, while according her spouse the same independence with respect to his assets. For a woman who marries later in life, or acquires stepchildren in the marriage, or has her own children from a previous union, this segregation of net worth is usually necessary to assure that her wealth is not transferred to the wrong beneficiaries should she predecease her spouse.

It is possible, however, for a woman’s financial independence within the relationship to go too far. One example is having a private stash that you keep hidden from your partner. The new popular term for such secret stashes is “financial infidelity.”

Sometimes both partners take financial independence too far. I have worked with couples who attempt to maintain their financial autonomy by allocating every expense between them, usually based on a formula that reflects their unequal incomes. He makes twice as much as her, so he pays 2/3 of the mortgage from his checking account, while she writes a second check for 1/3 from hers. While logical and equitable, at least initially, this can result in tedious, not always friendly, end-of-month settlement sessions where money is being transferred between the spouses to settle the score. At tax time, they ask their accountant to prepare the tax returns as though they were filing singly and then use these calculations to determine what each is entitled to from the refund on their joint tax return. Perfectly fair, perhaps, but is the time and expense of keeping two books for the household really worth it?

Financial Interdependence

Somewhere between codependence and complete independence lies a healthy balance, namely financial interdependence. This state results when couples establish shared goals and priorities, before they think about dividing assets and expenses. Joint accounts are then established to fund these goals, and each partner contributes to these accounts, ideally in an equal amount, and not necessarily based on relative ability to pay.

The couple also acknowledges that an economic union does exist, and that there are material benefits to such a union, as opposed to a simple and easily dismantled “shared overhead” arrangement. The partners rely on one another, while also recognizing that, at any time, each must be prepared to become financially responsible for himself or herself.

Interdependence also allows for differences in financial style. Suppose she’s a saver, and he’s a spender. Once the joint goals and household expenses are paid, the couple are free to divvy up the remains and go their separate ways. She gets to save, and he gets to spend, without having to check in with each other about the use of the extra money.

As a relationship expert might say—and this financial advisor would concur—there is nothing like a measure of separateness to make hearts, as well as finances, grow stronger.

About the Author

Eleanor K. H. Blayney, CFP^®, is president of Directions LLC, an online organization dedicated to educating and engaging women in personal finance. She is a licensed Certified Financial Planner and the author of Women's Worth: Finding Your Financial Confidence (2010), which speaks to women about the major financial issues they face, and The Home Budget Workbook (2010), a straightforward guide for creating and maintaining a practical budget. Eleanor is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and Cambridge University UK, and earned her MBA at the University of Chicago. She belongs to, and has served on the boards of, numerous professional organizations. To learn more about Eleanor, visit herwebsite.

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