Given a real-life anecdote of a complex ethical situation, judge whether or not a specific person is wrong here. Answer 'not answerable' if more information is required and 'answerable' if all the information is sufficient to answer who is wrong in this situation.

TL;DR - I have about $50k in student loan debt after 3 degrees while my SO’s parents paid for his education 100%. He wants me to keep paying for it out of a separate checking account after we get married. 

My boyfriend and I are looking to get engaged later this year. We’re trying to be responsible and have all of The Conversations you’re supposed to before you get married. We got to the finance part of that today. 

He said unequivocally that all bills, utilities, and normal costs (groceries, car repairs, etc) should be paid from a joint checking account that we’ll open while engaged, but he’d consider keeping a separate account open for “spending money,” etc. I told him I wasn’t entirely comfortable with that - he’s extremely trustworthy, but that still feels secretive and too easy to make into a problem. He agreed that made sense so he wouldn’t but asked if I was keeping a separate account to keep paying for my student loans. I was shocked and a little hurt, to say the least. 

He comes from an upper/upper middle class family who sent him to private school K-12 and paid for his college entirely. My parents are public school teachers so obviously they couldn’t do that for me, but I had a large part of undergrad covered with scholarships. I have two BAs and will finish grad school soon with a total debt of about $50k. Not great, but I know that’s still at or below average for our generation. 

He said he’s uncomfortable paying for debt he didn’t accumulate and doesn’t want that “affecting credit scores and stuff.” (It’s worth noting his parents are pretty secretive about money, so his financial education is... lacking.) I can understand that in general, and it would be a different conversation if he’d had his own debt that he paid off solo. I also explained that I’m not expecting him to write a check from his own salary while I go blow my own pay on dumb stuff. I feel like I’m being held at arm’s length or looked down on because of a completely normal, if shitty, part of life that he was just lucky enough to avoid. 

AITA for looking at marriage this way - a total combination of everything, including all the baggage in all its forms? Does it matter that our situations are so disparate in this instance?



answerable