Unless you go the trad, Islamic route and say, "Yeah, this is my domestic slave." I think that sucks even more.
You're thinking a little too hard about it, and it comes off like this nickel and diming is gonna kill a relationship more than the financial asymmetry itself. We've talked through expectations through the relationship and what happens if we break up, and we're both happy. You have so many question marks I don't know what's rhetorical or what isn't, but no, she's not gonna be homeless if we break up because she has a career.
> you are valuing her to some amount you made up (together?)
We just pay for rent and shared expenses proportionally to our income. We don't monitor it super closely, rent is always your biggest expense, so it's not a big deal if I pay for dinner once or she does.
And to say my relationship is unhealthy because of this really shows your world view. Maybe a relationship is all about money to you, but we value each other for reasons beyond that.
alternatively, life is too short to not worry about things like this, as mistakes can rob us of even this already short time we get
But anything in our personal accounts we can't see and don't monitor (I don't need to know exactly how much she spends on planners and crafts, but I know it's a lot, and she doesn't need to know exactly how much I spend on board/video games, but she knows it's a lot).
We also put money into our 401ks (I max mine out, she's getting closer to doing so) and I do additional investing on my own account, which I let her know how well it's doing every once in a while. I would love for her to do more investing besides 401k, even if just a little bit to get some understanding of how it works, but she doesn't want to have to think about it, so I handle it.
Periodically we'll have discussions on recalibrating how much to put into the joint, or some months we'll have the 'this month has more expenses than usual, we should probably go out to eat less and buy less things this month', but that's about it.
Seems to work out pretty well for us.
Been married 25 years with a joint account and no prenup; wouldn’t want it any other way. Life is too short to worry about things like this and personally I would find it a sign of mistrust so it wouldn’t work in the first place.