In Singapore, it is very common to see dual income households, where both husband and wife are working. And rightly so, as the cost of living here is quite high.
It is in this regard that I greatly admire single income households where either the husband or the wife alone is earning an incoome. I can understand that these single income families may want to have a parent stay home to look after their young children and take care of household matters.
However, this comes at a great financial cost on top of the sacrifice of one partner to stay home and look after the household.
Just looking at my colleague's financial situation and mine and we can see a stark difference in terms of financial status after 33 years in the workforce. We were classmates at university and both of us came from humble homes. Both of us have two children, a boy and a girl. Our children have graduated and started working.
The difference starts here:
His wife is a full time housewife, my wife is a career woman.
He stays in a
HDB Exec flat, I stay in a 4 bedroom condo, plus one investment condo
He has a car, while my wife and I have a car each.
His networth is slightly above $2M (including his
HDB), while our networth is slightly above $7M.
In the next post I will share how the 1 + 1 > 2 comes in.