Amongst my social group your approach is relatively unusual. A sizable fraction of adults can’t be bothered to form a budget and do bookkeeping. This always surprises me, but it seems to be true. You can’t really have an allowance system without some amount of tracking/budgeting.

Of course, most couples in my social circle are extremely wealthy by non-Bay Area standards, so that gives people a lot less direct incentive to be especially thrifty.

My parents, and my marriage, have a different system: we ask ourselves about every purchase if it’s likely to bring us as much joy as we feel the money is worth, and just don’t buy that much stuff because most things don’t seem like they’d bring us enough joy to be worth the outlay.

Then, when we want something expensive, and say “yes, a new couch will bring me joy even if it doesn’t bring you much joy”, we don’t worry about the cost all that much.

But having a non-scarcity mentality about this sort of thing is obviously a super privileged position to be in. When my father remarried, he tried this system with my stepmother and she... spent all their money on frivolities they couldn’t afford, and now he’s retired and barely has any savings.

So I don’t really recommend this system unless you and your partner have reasonably similar utility functions.

"My" approach is just the chip-in. The allowance system is what I ASSUME most people use (the one the article is advocating). I'm surprised the author thinks it's novel.

I agree on budgeting and bookkeeping. Frankly, we do neither. I buy a bigass TV because I want it, my wife buys some awesome workout gear because she wants it. It just works. But yes, it's a position of luxury to not have to budget.

FWIW My SO and me are the only people I know who do the allowance thing. My friends routinely talk about "he/she spent so and so much on $USELESS_ITEM, grumble grumble". I say "pocket money!" and they nod and laugh and don't do it because it makes them feel like children.

Doesn't that encourage waste? You seem to have decided that a certain portion of income will just be blown on random stuff.

I go with double-approval. You could call it a veto system. Both must agree before spending.

There is pre-approval for unavoidable expenses like bills, groceries, fuel, emergencies, and tolls.

You have to decide on your priorities. Accepting a certain amount of “waste” in exchange for happy spouses is a worthwhile trade for many couples, including my wife and me.