I don’t know about you, but for me, it’s easy to fall into the “if…then” trap when it comes to money. If we had an extra 400 dollars a month, then dot dot dot. Or, If we had a 5 bedroom home instead of a 3 bedroom home then dot dot dot. And when we start doing this if...then thing, it begins to impact our marriage.

Money is definitely top of the worry list for a lot of couples around the world. I know how hopeless it can feel about changing your financial situation, so I want to encourage you that we have some good news. The great news is not some get-rich-quick scheme. No, it’s that you can shift your marriage so that you can move away from that hopeless feeling, regardless of your financial situation. So let’s jump in.

How Financial Issues Impact Marriage

Before we get to the solution we need to spell the problem out. Not surprisingly, research finds that financial strain does impact marriage by reducing marriage quality and also reducing the stability of the marriage[i].

What’s fascinating is you can actually put a number to this. The direct link between financial strain and reduced marital satisfaction accounts for up to 15% of the total variation in marital satisfaction[ii].

If you are struggling financially or unhappy with your financial situation, you are far more likely to see your entire marriage as not working. I think this is good to point out because in this situation you have a pretty specific issue but you’re extrapolating it to a much larger one.

For me, that’s a checkpoint. As in: stop and think about it. Because what we just identified is that you may only have a money issue. But you’ve made that into a marriage issue. I think it begs the question, is that necessary? Yes — financial strains impacts marriage. But how much power have you given to that issue?

So money can be made into a bigger issue than it really is. But: just to continue the thought of how marriage is impacted by finances: financial issues also impact marriage indirectly through the way they change how you act. Financial strain due to unemployment, debt, low income or other issues increases stress and depressive symptoms for both spouses. This, in turn, reduces the amount of social support, warmth & affection which the spouses show to each other and increases the level of negative communication: things like anger, criticism or dislike. This behavior reduces marital satisfaction, and this reduced satisfaction increases depressive symptoms, creating a destructive cycle[iii]. So the way money makes you think and talk to each other ends up having a worse impact on your marriage than the money problem itself.

Other research supports this: A study from 2008[iv] entitled “Money Doesn’t Buy Happiness, but it Helps” compared low income and medium income couples. Low-income couples had higher levels of psychological distress and also scored lower on measures of marital adjustment.

And as we all know, financial difficulties are also one of the main reasons couples give after divorcing for why their marriage broke down[v].

Conversely, high income is directly linked to high marital satisfaction, and also indirectly influences it by reducing pressure and stress within the marriage[vi].

Now I know at this point it sounds like we have a simple formula: increase the moolah, increase the marriage mojo. But just stay with me for a bit longer.

Financial Satisfaction

I’d like to look at financial satisfaction. Financial satisfaction is not about having more money. It’s about being satisfied with the money you have.

Now financial satisfaction is strongly linked to marital satisfaction[vii]. As I mentioned, financial satisfaction is not the same as simply having lots of money, although it is negatively correlated with financial strain. There are other factors which influence financial satisfaction in marriage, including:

The perception that you have enough money and are coping.