No one else (that I see) has said it yet but you should be making payments on your student loans, they are the only debts you have not escapable via bankruptcy and that is a realistic possibility. I think too many people here are looking at the respective incomes and saying that the wife needs to get her act together (like he has done anything yet) when really it's you. 22K from moving debt? sounds like you left a higher paying job voluntarily and irresponsibly. You don't get to have a midlife crisis when you've still got student loan debt. That student loan debt isn't your wife's fault, and if she's got more in her retirement than you with your respective incomes that's saying something.
This really isn't the right website for you though, best case scenario you retire without having the government garnishing your social security checks to pay back your student loan debts. Homeless people on the street are further along towards retirement than you are. You're whole life isn't ahead of you anymore, you need to plan for the worst case scenario (for example loss of job leading to bankruptcy). What if 5 years from now we have a downturn, you get laid off and are looking for work for a few years who's going to hire the late 50's tech over the fresh out of college 23 year old? You should contribute to your 401k now for the matching at a minimum, otherwise you are throwing away free money and money that is protected if bankruptcy becomes a necessity.
Look hopefully it all works out there is no reason to be negative about past decisions beyond the positive of not making those same past decisions. You need to first get a handle on your situation more like Dave Ramsey style than even worry about early retirement.
My Early Retirement will be age 65 or 67.
I left a higher paying job for a lower paying one, along with taking a 27k hit on having to repay relocation assistance, because my wife was extremely unhappy living anywhere but Portland, OR. So we left the Bay area, me making 120k, to come back to Portland to make 60k. (The cost of living isn't much less here than where we lived in CA) While in CA, she insisted on flying back to Portland every month, ostensibly to work, being gone 1 or 2 weeks, and making about 1000 dollars. Out of that subtract airfare, gas, food, and repairs to Landcruiser.
When I said that had to stop, she refused, saying we "needed the money" but also because these trips were important to her sanity. At about the time we moved back, it was either move or divorce. One way we justified the income decrease was that she was making 1000 going back for a week, so living there would be 4000 per month. Not quite enough to make up for what I lost, but it was something. Of course, the income stayed at 1000 per month AND we were now paying back the relo assistance.
SOME of those school loans are just as much hers as they are mine, as we lived on student loans and grants I got my going to school for the first few years we were married. The school I went to was a 2 year intense program in which you clocked in in the morning and clocked out when you left, and put 40 hours in every week. I had to do this because my degree is in liberal arts, which is basically worthless, but I stupidly went to a private school back in the day. Anyway, when you graduate the 2 year program, everyone who wants a job has one because the demand is so high. Employers fly out to the school to interview graduates months before the end to hire them. During this two years, I lived by myself in a disgusting apartment so dilapidated that the bottom of the fridge was 6 inches out from the wall but the top of the fridge was against the wall. You didn't want to be outside after dark if you could help it. Often you woke up to find someone had broken car windows all up and down the street the night before. I lived on potatoes and peas.
Aside from the 40 hours of intense schooling, I tried working, but in that small town there was only hard labor jobs, and so for a while I was doing 60-80 hour weeks and found my grades dropped from straight A's to C's, and I got sick over and over again. Out of 22 people in my class, 4 worked. After a few months, only 2 worked. So I got by with federal funding, family loans, and once in a while my wife pitching in. She stayed in Portland to work while I moved 3.5 hours away to this school. I was putting in more hours than she was but little did I know she was furious, it wasn't fair, that she had to work while I didn't.
I received offers to work in Oahu, Reno, Boise, Sandpoint Idaho, and a few other places when I was done. I chose Reno, making 60k and my wife flying back to Portland every month. After a year I was told I would be laid off, so I got the 120k job in the bay area, with my wife still flying back for work. Eventually I saw that in her mind she never moved, that she still living in Portland but stayed out of town when she wasn't working. She didn't want to make a life outside of Portland and she wasn't happy.
So when I got the chance, I moved back here to Portland and she was ecstatic. She didn't get the increase in income she predicted, but I did get the cut in income plus a 27k debt that we've paid down to 22k now.
Yes, I know it was stupid. I have regretted it ever since. I should have just sent her back to Portland where she could be happy and me stay in the Bay area.
Yesterday I presented her with a plan I worked up on Excel using an idea someone on here mentioned: living on her income while paying debts with mine, and doing it if I get the CA job again and move there. She immediately wanted to know why SHE had to pay the monthly bills. Inside I just cringed. I told her it's all the same money pot, but this was a goal to work toward and a good one. I did a breakdown over time of what our monthly minimum bills would be as we paid off debts, got new phone plans, and so forth, and a year from the day I start in CA she'd have to gross 112 per day for 5 days.
Now, she earns 70 an hour massaging and she has another job where she can work for 20 an hour when she wants. I figured that's 8 massages per week. Two a day makes 4 days working. Or if she did one massage, she could work hourly for 3 hours. I thought it was an easy sell. It wasn't.
She demanded to know if I was going to work 7 days a week when I was in CA. I said not at first, as I was told if I get this job that I'd be required to study on my own time to get up to speed and weekends were pretty much it. This pissed her off. Why should she work her ass off here in Portland while I'm just living the good life in CA on the beach, sipping Mai Tais?
I reminded her I would have no car, bike to work, live in an 8x9 room living with roommates, and wouldn't be living the life of Reilly as all of my income would be going to debt. She was still angry. She's been working her ass off forever and now I'm going to CA to take it easy?
With her income streams, the first 3 months of this year she has made 3800 dollars gross. I didn't say it, but I wondered how she could be "working her ass off" if that was what she brought in?
And further I had to answer again why SHE had to pay the monthly bills. I didn't even work when I was at school out of state (apparently the 40 hours I spent at school were irrelevant, a responsible person would put in a full time job, too), and now I want her to pay the monthly bills? I showed her why this would be awesome, that she didn't have to work 7 days a week, just enough to gross a certain amount. With her earning power I thought this would be attractive to her, but she is incensed.
She has declared me to be lazy and declared herself to be someone who "works her ass off". She has declared that I should work 7 days a week if SHE is paying the monthly bills. At this point I do believe I am going to just go do my own thing if I get the CA job and not involve her in any of this. She can pay her necessities and I will go earn as much as I can somewhere to bail myself out of this debt. I won't give her a dime to live on, as she lives rent and utilities free, plus she can easily support herself. She has declared that this, too, is laziness on my part. I should financially support her, because she has worked her ass off.
Still keeping track of spending, but feel like giving up. Noticed that we spent 860 dollars the first four days, almost all of it on a naturopath and meds that she needs. Not covered by our insurance, we have to pay cash out of hand for this guy. I can see this has to stop, but then again medical bills arise from health issues which must be addressed. Noticed we spend a lot on bottled water. I drink none, but my wife insists because the water filter I use isn't good enough for the quality of water she wants. I have lived all week on 2 dollars worth of pinto beans plus some veggies I juiced.
Still going at it. Not giving up...yet. Perhaps if I get this CA job next week and move away things will brighten up.