Is it wrong for me to want to be my wife’s sole beneficiary?

In My Humble Opinion
21

You can’t depend on her son inheriting from his father. If the father is married, he might have things set up so that his wife gets everything when he dies.

Same with life insurance – is it a private policy or is it a policy through her employment? If the policies lapse for whatever reason, the kid gets nothing. If she has to use the funds in her IRA, he gets nothing. Her share of your house? How would that work? You’d buy him out?

It looks like she wants to assure that her son will have something when she dies, and maybe she believes the 50% of her 401-k is the only guaranteed asset she has to offer.

22

Yes, wrong- and this is a sore point I would not bring up again.

Now, if she was leaving it *all *to him, then I’d say something.

23

Yes, but it’s still joint income. If she’s putting money in a 401(k), that’s money that isn’t coming into the household to pay for bills. And she wants half of it to go to another adult outside the marriage, and she doesn’t want her husband to have a say in the matter.

The issue would be no different if she announced that she wants to leave half her retirement money to a church he doesn’t belong to, or to a charity of her choosing. Her desires may be admirable, but it’s still joint money and they should both agree to the disposition of it.

I think this is a basic relationship issue. Some couples are more controlling about where the money goes, and some give each other more leeway. How does she feel about you deciding to spend some money on something you want without her approval? Is she okay with that? Can you write a cheque to a charity without getting her approval? Does she ever stop you from buying things you want because she thinks it’s not fair? If a family member of yours became ill or had financial difficulty, would she complain if you offered to help financially?

Answers to these kinds of questions will tell you if she’s being reasonable or not. It can be fully reasonable to expect you to go along with this if in the past she has been reasonable about allowing you certain financial freedoms. But if she’s totally controlling of your money, but demands that her income be ‘hers’ and you have no say in the matter, then she’s being unreasonable. On the other hand, if you are the one who demands control of all financial decisions, and she believes you aren’t willing to do what she sees as ‘right’ with respect to her son, then this is merely an act of rebellion against you. Maybe she sees a 401(k) as being the only way she can ensure that her child is looked after, because you are controlling and unreasonable once the money is in your hands. That’s a bigger problem, and it’s going to haunt you in other ways.

Who’s right depends on what kind of relationship you have, and you haven’t really given us enough to judge.

24

Would the OP be offended if he had a daughter, wanted to do a 50/50 split with on his stuff, and the wife objected?

There’s marriage, and there’s blood.

25

She wants it to go to a first-degree relative with whom she has an enduring relationship, not her gigolo or an ex-con she met on the Internet.

26

Why would anyone risk a long-term relationship by trying to come between a mother and her child? You will always lose. My opinion.

27

Does that matter? Would it matter if she wanted to give it to breast cancer research, or any other worthy recipient?

Again, this isn’t a black and white issue. Remarriages when there is previous family is always difficult. If the poster of the OP went into the relationship fully knowing that she intended to provide for her grown son, then he’s got no gripe coming. But if this is a new development, that’s another matter.

Again, I’m not saying she’s wrong for wanting to help her son. But she has a responsibility to her husband as well, and he has a right to have a say in the disposition of joint finances.

It seems to me there an overriding issue here that’s potentially much more difficult - she doesn’t trust her husband to do what she sees as being the right thing. Or conversely, he thinks she is being overly generous to her son. Again, we don’t have the information to know what’s ‘right’ here. If her son is a layabout who refuses to hold down a job, has criminal behaviours, a drug/alcohol problem or a track record of being horribly irresponsible with money, then I’d say the OP has every right to demand that his share of their joint property not go to him.

On the other hand, if the son is a good person who is just not capable of earning a good income for whatever reason, and she wants to ensure that he’s cared for, then he’s being selfish for denying her wishes because he wants the money. But we have not been told anything about what the son is like or what has gone on before.

So once again, I think people in this thread are issuing moral pronouncements without having the facts.

As an aside, what are the legalities around this in the event of divorce? As I understand it, retirement packages are considered assets in divorce cases. If he builds up $100,000 in retirement income, and she builds up $100,000 in retirement income and they divorce, it would normally be a ‘wash’ and they’d each just keep their retirement packages and go their own way. But what if she’s declared half of hers to go to someone else? Now is it the case that she’d only have $50,000 in assets, and he’d have $100,000, so he’d have to cough up another $25,000 for her in a divorce? Or does the beneficiary not matter because she’s still alive, so it would still be an even split?

Let me point out another way in which this would be unfair - if they both die, their joint assets would be divvied up among the living family members absent a will. Let’s say he had a son from a previous marriage who wasn’t a co-beneficiary of his policy. How would that money be split amongst the two sons? Would the one who is a beneficiary get $50,000, plus half of the remainder? That would be unfair to the other one.

It’s not a simple issue.

28

To me, no, as I said above. It appeared to matter to you, so I was trying to identify what might be a salient issue to some, namely, that this is her child, not some random adult other.

29

I don’t think anyone is saying that he shouldn’t have a say in the matter.

30

If she doesn’t see her marriage as an “enduring relationship” then that should raise some giant fucking red flags.

Anything earned during the confines of the marriage should be liable to joint agreement.

31

I said nothing about the marriage, but about the relationship with her son. Mind your own giant fucking red flags.

“Confines,” huh?

32

IANAL, but am pretty informed about benefits issues. I agree with what you said at the end, it doesn’t matter since they are still alive. I suppose it’s possible that the terms of a divorce could dictate who needs to be maintained as beneficiary to what. But I think that would be a separate decision from dividing current assets.

To the original question, would the OP be more comfortable if the money went into a trust for the son? That way if he does inherit the money at a young age, there is a barrier to him squandering the money. It doesn’t sound like that’s the main concern, but I thought I’d mention it.

33

My suspicion is that this has nothing to do with the 401k and everything to do with you and your wife having different financial styles and both of you wanting “control.”

I’m guessing that you feel you earn most of the money and she spends most of the money. Your probably feel that you should at least get some veto power over how she spends joint assets. She probably feels that you treat her like a child when it comes to money and that she should get to spend how she sees fit.

(You are right, in that a 401k is supposed to be set up as retirement income and a survivor benefit - not a legacy. But that isn’t what this is about.)

34

You should be happy you are getting 50%. My parents have set up their will in such a way that if one of them should die and the other remarry the new incoming partner gets nothing in the event of the second parent’s death. Us kids get our grubby mitts on everything.

You folks are obviously younger and from a different situation, but I think she is completely in her right to ensure that her child is taken care of.

35

A persons will is private. In no way should anybody pressure ANYBODY parent, spouse, child, best friend or total stranger on how to dispose of any and all assets.

Frankkly, if she wants the 401 to go to her son, he is a survivng dependent and qualifies, it isnt like she is trying to give it to any random crack whore off the street. If she wanted to give it to her mother would you have issues? If the house was in both names, if she chose to give her half of the house to her son, legally she can. If she wants to give every worldly posessionand her ‘half’ of the family assets to her son, she can.

It is her choice who she wants to give her assets to. Would it wierd you out so fragging much if it was a son by YOU? If not, then you are an ass. I know that supposedly we are genetically programmed to want to protect our own seed, to the point of excluding anything not our ‘seed’ but this is stupid. It is long past teh time when women were chattel possessions. Stop treating your wife’s earnings as your due

36

Nobody, included the OP, said anything about her assets. We’re talking about joint assets, acquired during the marriage.

So the man’s money is their money, but her money is hers? Man, I wish I lived in your world.

37

That requirement is imposed by the Federal tax code, which was written with the well intentioned goal of preventing husbands from assigning their retirement benefits to their girlfriends instead of to their wives. Now in the era of second and third marriages, and with children from previous marriages that present spouses have no interest in but whose parent may want to leave some money from his or her retirement plan to, that section of the tax code probably needs some tweaking.

38

That money is meant for your retirement, if she wants to leave something for her son she should take out a insurance policy or work it out in the will. I suggest you seek the help of a financial planner and an attorney if you don’t have a will to work these issues out. There are many reasons not to have the money go her son and I think some impartial help might take care of this issue without further strife between you and your wife.

39

You know, I’m pretty sure no one has expressed this opinion in this thread except for the people attempting to argue against it. If the OP has a 401k, or something similar, it is my opinion that he should have every right to distribute it as he sees fit upon his death.

Of course, this is one of those situations where really, no answer is the right answer. The inherent problem is not really who is named on the beneficiary form of what policy. The problem is that the wife in the OP does not trust her husband to do right by her son and abide by her wishes in the event of her death. And her lack of trust is well-justified - the OP has made it clear that if she dies, he wants the power to give her son whatever he pleases, her wishes be damned.
I don’t have to specify provisions for the care of my daughter in my will because I trust my wife and know that she knows my wishes and will take them into account in the event of my death. Frankly, if I were in a marriage where I thought my spouse would without reservation disregard my wishes once I croaked - where I believed that what I wanted was irrelevant to my partner, and that the minute I was no longer around to defend my wishes they would be gleefully ignored - I wouldn’t bother with legal protections. I’d leave the marriage, and find someone who respected me more than that.

40

The point I and others have tried to make is that the existence of the 401K is in part because the OP is paying for other joint expenses.

My own situation is similar. Mr. Athena makes a fair bit more than I do. The way we’ve divided our income is that his paycheck pays for all our day-to-day expenses. He pays the mortgage, utilities, grocery bill, etc. My paycheck gets put in a savings account, and we use it to pay for retirement savings (we both have individual retirement accounts), vacations, taxes, and other “big” expenses as they come up.

By your logic, I would be completely in my rights to take as much as I want of MY money and bequeath it to a charity, or make huge contributions to my retirement account and list anyone I wanted as a beneficiary. That seems very unfair to me, as the only reason I have money to do any of that is because he pays the monthly expenses. Our money is just that - OUR money. We both have equal say in where it goes. Sounds to me that the OP simply wants the same thing. He never said he wanted to cut the son out of the will altogether; he just wanted a say in the matter.