Frank the Financially Savvy Atheist - The F.S.A.

Saw this intriguing post over at Make Love, Not Debt (thanks to Mapgirl). While Him was specifically talking about Asian parents and Asian culture, as a non-Asian immigrant to the US as well as being in an interracial marriage with my Asian wife, I believe I can offer some perspective on this issue.

First off: "Do you give money to your parents other than for special occasions?" The only time we've given money to either of our parents was the loan to my mother which isn't actually giving now is it :).

Secondly: "Do they expect (whether it is spoken or not) to be repaid financially for their work as a parent?". My wife's parents certainly do (at least her mother does), and for my parents, I think my mom would like me to when she retires and my dad is basically banking on me for a good retirement. I'll get to that dichotomy in a second.

Thirdly: "What does your significant other think about this cultural repayment plan?" My wife is ok with giving money to my mom and my step-dad and dislikes the idea of giving money to my dad. She feels a compelling sense of obligation to give to her mother and I absolutely detest the idea of giving her mom any money (my wife doesn't feel quite as compelled with her father, because he's done fine on his own...her parents are separated).

That's our take in a nutshell. For those who are interested, the remaining part of the post gets very personal, so feel free to skip it.

Warned you.

About the dichotomy between my parents. My mom and dad have never been married, I am what you call...a bastard child. In the tradition of many great black men before him [/sarcasm] my dad was never around when I was growing up. In fact, I had only seen him 3 times before I started college. Now that I've gone to a pretty good school and am on a fairly good trajectory salary-wise, he's starting to keep in contact more often (i.e. more than once-a-year). Why? Because he's in his 50s with only $50,000 in his 401(k) and he's going to need someone to help him in retirement. That's where I come in. Needless to say I'm not that enthusiastic about giving him any money and my wife isn't that enthuastic either. So at most we'll probably give him $50/month (he is my dad after all, even if he is a dead-beat). Even then, we might not give him anything.

On to my wife's parents. They are currently divorced after several years of marriage. Her dad is doing fine and I don't expect that he'll need anything from any of his kids. Her mother on the other hand is definitely outspoken about her desires in a kind of passive-aggressive manner. She'll say things like "I wish I could retire, but if only my kids loved me enough to help" or some such thing. Plus, as a child, it was impressed upon my wife that the children take care of the parents.

All that is fine and good, and I can understand the cultural differences, Asian families are different, yada, yada, yada. But the kicker is this: by any objective standard, my wife's mother was a teriible parent. Absolutely terrible and at the same time absolutely resolute in her belief that none of it was her (my wife's mothers) fault. Some of the stories that my wife told me are painful to recount, and I can hear anger creep into her typically cheerful voice.

And despite all that's happened to my wife, she still feels a sense of obligation to give back to her mom! For me this is frustrating to say the least. I can bring up event after event and even though she gets angry about it, she still wants to offer monetary assistance to her mother. Right now we've compromised at $50-$100/month in groceries from a peapod-type delivery service after she retires. The rest of her siblings can help out as needed.

As for my mom, we'll probably do $100-$200 in cash. It just depends.

There's not an easy answer to this, as we have our own family to take care of right now. At the same time, we'll keep discussing it with each other and look at our budget when the time comes.