世論 What Japan Thinks

Last year (I’m just getting round to translating it now!) iShare conducted an interesting survey looking into family budget management, split into two parts, those who wish to marry and those already married. Today is the unmarried half of the survey.

Demographics

Over the 6th and 7th of December 2010 1,140 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was split into two groups; first, there were 568 unmarried but hoping to be married people; 66.9% of them were male, 18.5% in their twenties, and 81.5% in their thirties. Next, 572 were married, with 55.9% of them male, 6.1% in their twenties, and 93.9% in their thirties.

It’s interesting to note that the amount of married men who would like to keep their salary and saving secret is about double the amount of unmarried men who said they would want to keep it secret!

Research results

Married demographic

Q1: Which of you are currently working? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Both work (to SQ1)	49.5%	49.1%	50.0%
Just I work	27.3%	47.2%	2.0%
Just partner works (to SQ1)	21.3%	0.9%	47.2%
Neither are working	1.9%	2.8%	0.8%

Q1SQ1: Do you know how much your spouse earns? (Sample size=283)

	All	Male N=157	Female N=126
Yes (to SQ2)	77.7%	75.2%	81.0%
No	22.3%	24.8%	19.0%

Q1SQ2: Who earns more, you or your spouse? (Sample size=220)

	All	Male N=118	Female N=102
Me	46.4%	74.6%	13.7%
Partner	40.0%	11.0%	73.5%
Both about the same	13.6%	14.4%	12.7%

Q2: Do you know how much savings your spouse has? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Yes	41.1%	32.2%	52.4%
No	58.9%	67.8%	47.6%

Q3: Do you think that you both should know how much each other earns and has saved? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Should know both	50.2%	45.9%	55.6%
Should know salary only	22,4%	19.4%	26.2%
Should know savings only	2.1%	2.8%	1.2%
No need to know either	25.3%	31.9%	17.1%

Q4: Do you keep a family budget? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Yes	45.8%	46.3%	45.2%
No (to SQ)	54.2%	53.8%	54.8%

Q4SQ: Have you ever lost track of spending money, such as forgetting what you used money on? (Sample size=310)

	All	Male N=172	Female N=138
Often	13.2%	14.0%	12.3%
Sometimes	57.4%	58.7%	55.8%
Never	29.4%	27.3%	31.9%

Q5: Are you saving for a specific objective or to reach a specific monetary target? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Only an objective (to SQ)	13.1%	13.1%	13.1%
Only a monetary target (to SQ)	17.8%	19.4%	15.9%
Both an objective and a monetary target (to SQ)	17.0%	15.9%	18.3%
Neither an objective nor a monetary target (to SQ)	36.4%	33.1%	40.5%
Not saving anything	15.7%	18.4%	12.3%

Those who didn’t keep a family budget were much more likely not to be saving.

Q5SQ: Are you able to save more now than when you were single? (Sample size=482)

	All	Male N=261	Female N=221
Yes	39.4%	39.5%	39.4%
No	60.6%	60.5%	60.6%

Q6: Do you have a shared family budget accouynt? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Yes (to SQ)	37.6%	38.4%	36.5%
No	62.4%	61.6%	63.5%

Q6SQ: Do you have a secret personal bank account for saving your left-over pocket money? (Sample size=215)

	All	Male N=123	Female N=92
Yes	65.6%	67.5%	63.0%
No	34.4%	32.5%	37.0%

Q7: Have you ever had a fight with your spouse over money? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Yes (to SQ)	26.4%	23.8%	29.8%
No	73.6%	76.3%	70.2%

Q7SQ: What were the fights about? (Sample size=151, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=76	Female N=75
Usage of living expenses	58.3%	67.1%	49.3%
Amount of pocket money	28.5%	27.6%	29.3%
How much to save every month	20.5%	19.7%	21.3%
Use of money on travel, other expenses outside the home	15.9%	21.1%	10.7%
Finding out about debts	14.6%	6.6%	22.7%
Spending money outside of telephone, utility bills, living costs	10.6%	11.8%	9.3%
Finding out about money spent on a big ticket item after the event	10.6%	3.9%	17.3%
Telephone, mobile phone bill	10.6%	9.2%	12.0%
Utility bills	9.3%	6.6%	12.0%
Gift money (at weddings, etc)	3.3%	5.3%	1.3%
Finding out about a secret bank account	0.7%	0.0%	1.3%
Other	15.9%	14.5%	17.3%

Q8: Do you think you currently have wasteful money habits? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Very much so	21.3%	18.1%	25.4%
To some extent	58.4%	59.4%	57.1%
Not at all	20.3%	22.5%	17.5%

Q9: Do you take enough time to talk with your spouse about money? (Sample size=572)

	All	Male N=220	Female N=252
Yes	23.1%	22.5%	23.8%
No, not enough	57.7%	60.9%	53.6%
No, not at all	19.2%	16.6%	22.6%