DEAR JEANNE & LEONARD: When my wife and I go out to a restaurant with friends, I hate having to figure out who pays for what at the end of the meal. How can we ask for separate checks without looking like cheapskates?
-- Corey
DEAR COREY: Order a very expensive meal.
Kidding aside, there is nothing cheap about asking for separate checks. If that's what you'd like to do, simply bring it up when you're first seated, before your companions have ordered a half dozen Moscow mules or the Wagyu steak. Once you've been seated, all you need to say is something to the effect of: "We've found it's easiest to ask for separate checks. Hope that's OK with you."
DEAR JEANNE & LEONARD: My husband and I have four children, two from his first marriage and two from mine, and here's our problem: My husband's children are in college now. He's paying 40 percent of their expenses; his ex-wife is paying 40 percent; and each child has taken out a loan for the remaining 20 percent. When my kids start college in a few years, my ex and I have agreed that we'll each pay 45 percent of their expenses, leaving each child to borrow the remaining 10 percent. My husband is unhappy with these arrangements because they mean his children are going to end up with significantly more debt than mine, and he's worried that his children will come to resent my two over it. I see his point, but I'm not sure what to do. Your thoughts?
-- Blended & Confused
DEAR B&C: What about how your children might feel if they learned they'd been saddled with twice as much debt as necessary just to protect their stepsiblings' feelings? You don't think they'd be resentful? And what about your ex-husband? Is he willing to stand by and let his children take a bullet so that the children of his former wife's current husband get to feel better?
Look, unequal and unfair are not the same thing. Suppose, for example, that when your husband's children stay with their mother, they stay in a much nicer home than your children stay in when they visit their father. Would that be unfair to your children? Of course not. Moreover, if your children resented the disparity, we assume you'd tell them to get over it, not imagine that your husband's ex-wife should move to more modest digs. In the same way, how much support your children receive during their college years should not be based on how much their stepsiblings are receiving, but rather on how much you and their father can afford.
However, if your husband is the principal breadwinner, or if he's been picking up a disproportionate share of your joint housing expenses -- if, in other words, he's the reason you're in a position to pick up 45 percent of your children's college tabs -- that changes everything. In that case, forget about the children. It's your husband who would have reason -- good reason -- to be resentful.
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Family on 08/31/2016