When marriage becomes a financial trap

I had a friend at school whose mother used to steal money from her husband’s wallet on a regular basis. When my mother shared this gossip with us, I remember being a bit put off by my auntie’s apparent lack of virtue. My younger self had been taught that stealing was a sinful act, and thus, I could not understand what reason there could be for an adult woman to engage in such an act. The 12-year-old version of me could barely realise back then that many unfortunate women like my friend’s mother resort to petty theft because they have been financially abused throughout their lives.

There are millions of women all over the world who have absolutely no access to money. Not a single paisa to their name. Many of them even live in houses with granite countertops and a Toyota RAV4 or Land Cruiser in the garage, yet every time they need to purchase even the most basic necessities, such as groceries, they have to ask their husbands for permission and show them receipts afterwards. These might seem like extreme cases to some, but in a world that has long been dominated by patriarchy, these are the real stories of real women who have experienced financial abuse in more ways than one. They are your mothers, your sisters, your friends, your neighbours and maybe even you. And they live like hostages behind the grey concrete walls of high-rise towers or amid the dust and squalor of the city’s underbelly.

Contrary to popular opinion, financial abuse does not always look like financial struggle. While it can look like a middle-class mother scavenging for stray coins in her purse to afford new school supplies for her daughter, it can also look like a woman travelling in her family’s new Mercedes to Espresso Lounge and spending more than 5,000 taka in one sitting. What makes their stories similar is that both women have to remember to ask their husbands for permission before making any financial decision, whether it involves buying school supplies for their children from a local shop or buying brunch for themselves at a posh restaurant.

Every single day, these women require “approval” to spend money on everything, even common household items such as kitchen utensils or personal necessities such as menstrual hygiene products. Like my friend’s mother, some of them, finding no other alternative, resort to stealing cash from their partners and hiding it in their jewellery boxes.

The most intriguing thing about financial abuse is that it is not always obvious. It does not always occur openly, so for a woman, beyond empty bank accounts, it can mean having no monthly allowance, little to no share of her partner’s monthly income, no access to joint funds, no debit or credit cards in her name, no income of her own, no bank account and, consequently, no safety net at all. It can also mean a husband who questions, “What do you even need money for when I am paying for everything?” Or a husband who quite lovingly says to her, “Don’t worry about money. I’ll handle it.” And then, years later, when her marriage turns upside down, she is afraid to leave because she does not have any money in her account. Why? Because she never had to worry about money or bank accounts in the first place.

And that is how financial abuse works: slowly, silently and, most of the time, strategically. By the time these women finally realise that they have been subjected to financial abuse by their partners in one way or another, they wish somebody had told them sooner: you need your own money.

According to data sourced from the World Bank Group’s Gender Data Portal, women comprised only 38.6 per cent of the labour force in Bangladesh in 2025; in other words, around 61.4 per cent of Bangladeshi women of working age do not participate in the formal labour market and thus have no personal income from formal employment. Additionally, according to data from the same portal, in 2024, only 33.3 per cent of Bangladesh’s female population reportedly had an account, either individually or jointly with someone else, at a bank or another type of financial institution, or had used a mobile money service in the previous 12 months. This indicates that about 66.7 per cent of Bangladeshi women neither have a bank account nor use mobile financial services. Data from ActionAid Bangladesh reveals that Bangladeshi women perform 85 per cent of all household chores as unpaid labour, spending an average of nearly 6.8 hours on such work every day.

Every single one of these women needs her own money. Not because they plan to leave their husbands or families without any valid reason. Not because they cannot or do not trust their partners. Not because they want to live their lives wilfully or recklessly, without a care in the world. But because life happens in the most unpredictable ways. People lose jobs at the most crucial moments of their lives. Businesses fail, and bank accounts get frozen. Accidents and disasters happen, resulting in the loss of lives, property and stability. Love goes awry. People change because their minds change. The world can shift overnight. And when any of these misfortunes befall a family, having an additional source of income, a second bank account and/or a certain amount of savings provides financial protection, allowing women to protect themselves, their children and the rest of their families against such hardships.

One of the most enduring mechanisms through which patriarchy has maintained its hold over women has been to keep them financially dependent; not just broke in the moment, but systemically, structurally and generationally broke. Forcing women out of the workforce is one of the most insidious forms of social control exercised by patriarchal societies. These societies, in many devious ways, try to make it an unavoidable “choice” for women to prioritise their homes over their careers. “You are allowed to continue working as long as meals have been prepared for everyone, your children’s homework has been completed, routine household chores have been done, and all other needs of your family members have been sufficiently met,” the husband and in-laws declare. With little to no support from their immediate families, the burden of these double shifts often becomes unbearable for working women. Next, we see their families vehemently encouraging, and even forcing, them to leave their jobs on the grounds that their husbands are already earning enough to support the family.

Stripped of her earnings, a woman loses not just her confidence and identity but also her financial cushion. This, in turn, ensures that every taka in the household passes through someone else’s hands, usually her husband’s. If any untoward event affects her marital relationship, she may find herself powerless to leave simply because she cannot afford to. We call a woman’s decision to quit her job and focus on household responsibilities her “choice”, but without any personal income, her choices eventually narrow down to one: stay. 

In Bangladesh, the percentage of ever-married women aged between 15 and 49 who have experienced physical or sexual violence by their husband or partner, widely known as intimate partner violence, is 48.9 per cent, which is 27 percentage points higher than the world average. For many of these women with no income of their own, the only choice is to stay. Stay in the marriage, no matter how abusive it is. Stay in the house, no matter how toxic its environment is. Stay in the role, no matter how suffocating it feels. This is neither a coincidence nor bad luck. This is an entire system working exactly as it was designed.

Money is freedom, yet too many women are still being taught that dependence is just another name for devotion and that unquestioning silence is a badge of honour. This has to change. Families must fully understand the importance of education and financial independence for their daughters. Before deciding to marry them off hastily at a young age, parents must ensure that their daughters have their own sources of income. Also, instead of spending millions on their weddings, parents need to invest that money in their daughters’ education and save a substantial amount of it in a bank account as a safeguard. Most importantly, parents must respect their daughters’ property rights under the country's existing legal framework. Government intervention, when these rights are violated, must be strengthened and strictly enforced. Educational institutions need to make classes on personal finance mandatory so that female students can formally learn how to make important financial decisions. Both public and private organisations need to make necessary adjustments to their workplaces for female employees, particularly working mothers, by offering flexible working arrangements, paid maternity leave, in-house childcare facilities and opportunities for remote work.

Easier said than done, of course. Expecting an entire social system that has endured for generations to change its mindsets, norms and practices overnight is simply unrealistic. But combined, dedicated efforts on all fronts can certainly have transformative effects on numerous women’s lives. If the measures outlined above are properly implemented, perhaps these women will no longer have to choose between their careers and their homes. Perhaps they will no longer have to ask anyone for permission to spend money. And perhaps they will no longer feel compelled to stay if they experience financial abuse at any point in their lives.

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Nadia Afroze Disha is a lecturer at BRAC Business School, BRAC University.

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